The X-COM Files
by Illuviar
Summary: Conspiracies, Cults, strange events and attacks by impossible creatures and that is just the tip of the iceberg. Can a world plagued by so much strife and unusual activity prevail and get together to face that might be their greatest challenge yet or would the eventual arrival of the Ethereals be seen as a ray of hope for a civilization at the brink of collapse?
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I don't own any of the X-COM or Mass Effect games, nor any other games, books or movies that might be mentioned or served as an inspiration of this story. It is not for sale or rent. I make no money of it.**

* * *

 **The X-COM Files**

 **=X=**

 **Prologue**

 **=X=**

* * *

 **21 February 1997**

 **Iceland**

Freezing northern wind howled over steep rocky shores carrying fat snow flakes. Down below the dark sea smashed into freezing foam, yet the ground was warm due to local geothermal pools. The effect of the clashing elements was spectacular, especially where hills broke the incoming wind. Fog oozed all over the area, from hot and oppressing in the centre, where steam rose from bubbling pools of water, to just wet enough to make feeling the cold that much worse on the edge.

It was there, where in the middle of the night a purple glow illuminated the shore and made the steamy air look as if on fire. The air itself cracked with unseen power and the water drops in it began to shine with the same energy that lit up the area. A thump echoed through the fog, a sound of metal hitting stone.

"You exceeded my expectations for a third time, human." A raspy voice that held a tremendous amount of power echoed throughout the fog. "You were meant to give your people a chance, to buy them the time they dearly needed. It was expected that you would die in the process. You had no training after all and while you do have the gift, it wasn't anything to write home about as your kind tends to say."

Deep inside the fog, nearly at the centre of the bubbling hot spring, a purple rift in reality twisted and turned in ways the human mind couldn't comprehend. In front of it a tall, spindly figure floated. It possessed two pairs of thin, bony arms, though the rich red robes and the dark armour they covered did an excellent job of hiding how frail the being appeared to be.

At its feet, another figure laid in a heap. It was a man clad in dented and cracked black armour. Its paint was burned and peeling, leaving just a faded hint of a logo and intelligible shoulder patch.

"Three times you exceeded my expectations." The floating figure continued after examining the one of the rocky ground for a few moments. "Do you know what's the traditional reward for a job well done among my people?" It inquired in a tone that hinted it might actually like some input instead of simply monologuing.

A painted grunt answered it.

"Curiously enough, it tends to be the same, a new and harder job." An arm pointed at the fallen man and four thin, long fingers stretched towards it as offering a helpful hand. "Here and now, your people face a hint of the real enemy. My people in this reality will come visit sooner rather than later and when that happens, humanity better be ready. I found your potentially useful allies. Do prove me right or this world will suffer the consequences."

The floating figure crossed his hands in his people's farewell gesture, turned around and moved through the pulsating crack in reality. It closed with a snap right behind and thus the purple glow vanished as if it was never there. However, it took time for the energy in the air to dissipate and the fog continued to glow, if dimer and dimmer over the next few hours.

The light-show was enough to garner interest from the closest village and a soon people were out and about despite the ever increasing snowfall. They got to the hot spring just in time to find and recover a wounded stranger in a need of immediate medical attention.

* * *

 **=X=**

 **5 May 1996**

 **Project Insight HQ**

 **Munich**

 **Germany**

Strange happenesances, legends, horror stories, conspiracies and simply the not yet explained. Since the dawn of the century, all of those had increased across the world in a frankly concerning fashion. The two world wars and the following cold one that on multiple occasions nearly became hot, were a fertile ground for all kinds of things that should have been left slumbering or simply never pursued got disturbed and the consequences, they were becoming more and more overt as the years passed.

It all began almost innocently; too low key for people to really pay it any particular attention. An increase of crime here, strange behaviour over there. Ancient forces began to awaken, others made impotent for millennia got their powers back a tiny bit by tiny bit. A gruesome murder in New Orleans, a charismatic cult leader gaining popularity Arizona, a string of kidnappings in Europe... On the face of it, there was no connection. There were many explanations of the rising instability, crime rate and cases of people getting insane, good ones at that. Plausible, even. Politicians all over the globe vowed to be harder on crime, increased financing of their law enforcement agencies and said all the correct sounding things on TV and radio.

It was all business as usual at least until early '94. It was then that a series of events across the continental United States and Europe made certain people in governmental circles stop and take notice.

Jerome Brown, knew that very well. Couple of years ago, he was an up and coming detective in New York who was just getting to grips with his time spent in the military during Desert Storm. For him, the first taste of the unusual came during that short conflict, though it was easily dismissed as a hallucination caused by spilled chemicals. The death of two of his people written off as a tragic accident caused by that exposure.

He believed that narrative; he wanted to believe it. It was certainly more plausible having a fatal run in with a desert Jinn.

What happened back home however, well it brought everything back. That case put him on the path that led here, to Germany and the establishing of Project Insight...

* * *

 **=X=**

 **17 September 1995**

 **Shinning Path Compound**

 **Arizona**

Ruby Ridge, Waco and now this. It hasn't been a good time for the FBI lately. No one really wanted yet another siege, yet here they were again. State Police had the perimeter locked down tight along with National Guard elements, multiple FIB special units, including the famous HRT were in place along with SWAT groups from the nearby city and an ever increasing army of reporters and protesters were nearby causing problems for everyone.

Horatio Davis had the unenviable position of being the agent in charge of the whole circus, which meant that when everything went to hell, it would be his head on the chopping block. He was bound by conflicting orders and agendas, trying to juggle too many balls at the same time and just to make everything better, considering the kind of people the FBI suspected the Shining Path to be, he would rather be accused of Waco's fallout and would gladly take the blame for that fiasco in exchange of not having to deal with this.

In the tent behind him people from the Governor's office, a representative of the Director, the local government and all the agencies taking part in the circus argued. The dry heat wasn't helping tempers and he was just glad that this wasn't happening in Florida – even lower temperatures there were much harder to handle thanks to the infernal humidity there. On the other hand, if this mess happened in that state, then it wouldn't have landed in his lap, or perhaps that was wishful thinking.

Horatio rubbed his receding brown hair and sighed. The people he was supposed to work with were busy having yet another shouting match and nary any of them noticed he stepped out for a moment to gather his thoughts and calm down before he lost his temper and thus made the situation even worse if at all possible. His grey eyes scanned the Path's compound in the distance. The place was well lit up – they hadn't cut off electricity or water yet to avoid escalation. At least officially. Unofficially, doing so would be of a marginal help at best. The compound was a far cry of what the FBI had to siege in the past. Neil Kole, the cult leader and top current contender for biggest pain in Davis' ass, was loaded, both from an inheritance and help from wealthy suckers, some of whom were locked tight along with him – just another issue that made the situation even more politically tenuous than such a siege would otherwise be. That meant the compound was the closest to self-sufficient you could find in this part of the US. There were damn expensive solar panels on the roofs combined with a few wind mills for power generation, not to mention a ridiculously large fuel tank for generators, something that was enough by itself to summon nightmares of a nasty fire and a second Waco in the making. The cultists were rumoured to be excellently stocked with food too and they had a large and nasty arsenal of the best small arms money could buy. It was an open question how many of them knew what to do with those weapons, however considering that the compound was built like a modern day Alamo, just a few could be enough to ruin his day.

As if all that wasn't enough, there was something in the air today. It was some kind of nervous energy that made everyone on edge and frayed their patience even worse than usual.

A commotion coming from the road leading towards the compound and the main law enforcement camp in the area got his attention. Multiple black SUVs were making their way towards him – he could count at least ten but there could be more, he wasn't in a position to see the end of the convoy, just that it was large enough

"Great, now that?" Horatio spat a couple of colourful curses before regaining control of his irritation and surprise. "Perez, Jansen, who are our new friends?" He shouted to his liaisons with the other agencies.

Davis' tone was sharp enough to cut through the still ongoing argument and the people inside the tent piled out just in time to see the convoy arrive.

"I've got nothing, sir." Monica Perez admitted. "No one should be bringing this many people or equipment. We certainly didn't request such assistance, whatever it is."

"I'm at a loss, too boss." Wendell Jensen reluctantly admitted.

"Ideas, anyone?" Horatio grumbled. At least no one had decided to sent in the military, which was a small miracle. There were loons calling for it on the news believing that the army could deal with the issue faster and with fewer casualties when the FBI inevitably fucked up by the numbers.

That estimation took a huge hit when the cars stopped and the passengers waited for a few moments so the dust raised by their arrival could settle or at least partially disperse before they got out.

The people who got out of the SUVs looked like they meant business and made Horatio's heart sink as well as stroked his building anger. They were decked in tactical kit in desert camouflage and looked like army special forces. They were certainly armoured and armed heavily enough to pass for Delta or something.

"What the hell?!" It was Jensen who voiced Horatio' thoughts.

* * *

 **=X=**

 **8 January 1994**

 **New York**

In an office building just a few streets over from the famous New York Stock exchange, Detective Jerome Brown did his absolute best not to spill his breakfast and two coffees on the crime scene. He had seen a number of the horrors people could do to each other during Desert Storm. A field containing the still burning remains of a whole Iraqi regiment of the Republican Guard that got caught in the open, with their pants down, by Allied air power was the only thing that came close. There were hundreds of wrecked vehicles and the torn pieces of a few thousand people. Some poor bastards were maimed, burned and still alive when Brown's unit got there. Others, well, what was left of them was still prominent in his nightmares.

This crime scene was a comparable slaughterhouse, minus the smell of cooked flesh, which was a small silver lining he would be forever grateful for. Instead, here the walls and even the ceiling were painted red. When he thought of a slaughterhouse, by the looks of it, this was a literal one. Whoever did this atrocity, for there was no lesser word to use, was blade happy. There were sliced and cut off pieces all over the place and if the gruesome shrine in the centre of the office space was anything to go by, this was the same bastard Jerome had been after since the beginning of the week. He was already investigating two murders, single persons fortunately, nothing like this, where the sick bastard responsible had built a similar, if much smaller and less sophisticated shrine with parts of the poor bastards he slaughtered.

Brown averted his gaze from the sick mockery of an altar, which had a bunch of forensic techs busying around.

* * *

 **=X=**

 **Chapter 1**

 **=X=**

 **Part 1**

 **=X=**

 **2 January 1994**

 **New York**

An irritating, insistent ringing brought him back to the world of the living. Jerome Brown groaned under his soft, warm covers, before habits trained by years in the military kicked in and he groggily got up. Once he slid out of bed, the brisk air of his bedroom was enough to awake him in a hurry. The central heating in his flat was acting up again, it seemed. Jerome sighed and headed for the bathroom for his morning rituals, something he interrupted to go put the kettle on to make himself a hot cup of coffee – just what the doctor prescribed. A scalding shower helped him feel more like a real human being and the heater in the kitchen did wonders for his muscles and joints, which did cause him some problems, especially in the winter after years of abusing them in the military.

Brown checked the time, concluding he had more than enough time for his morning shift even if the city was still partly buried by snow after last night. He switched the radio in the kitchen on, not wanting to do the same to the TV in the living room, which would require leaving the doors open and thus letting all the sweet heat go away to the rest of the flat – a big no-no at this time of the year when the central heating was down. There was some catchy rock song on he wasn't familiar with, with the news and weather forecast about to follow and he was up just long enough to catch them while he got a breakfast ready.

While cooking, Jerome rubbed his shaved head – which was in need of trimming up. Ever since that nasty accident back in the desert, he has been losing hair and soon decided to get rid of the rest of the hair instead of fighting a futile holding action. At least he looked decent with a shaved head, something that not everyone could claim. At least in his distinguished opinion anyway. With no spouse or stable relationship on the horizon, that left his opinion on the matter as the one that mattered.

He got the eggs and bacon out of the frying pan and into a plate. He knew very well that such a breakfast was far from healthy – his six pack was slowly going away, though he wasn't sure if it was the diet of junk food he enjoyed half the time nowadays or the comparative lack of exercise in contrast to what he subjected himself to back in the army. Eh, come spring he would do something about it. Being a bloody civilian did have its benefits – no runs in the cold unless he absolutely had to, like when chasing a suspect. Besides, his joints did thank him for the reduced activity lately.

Jerome finished his breakfast paying half-ear to the news anchor. He heard nothing noteworthy or new until the weather forecast.

Once he was done eating, cleaning after himself and making sure he was dry and warm, Brown got his work suite on, complete with his badge, gun, cuffs and all other little things that he often found useful to carry around. Just in time too, because when he looked out of the window, his partner just parked outside. He got his coat and headed out. It was time to see how the New Yorkers decided to kill each other at the start of the new year.

"Jerry, get in and close the door!" Greg Vargas, his partner waved him to hurry up when he got to the car. Jerome couldn't blame him either – the temperature outside was way south of freezing but at least it wasn't snowing any more.

Gregory was a small man of a mixed Mexican descent, who hated cold weather with a passion. He was hard to see, hidden behind layers of clothes he had on to keep the chill out was funny, though Brown wasn't one to really mention it. The bloody cold made his knees and left elbow stiff despite the warm clothes he had on too. At least the car's AC was up and running merrily, making it pleasantly warm.

"How was the vacation, Greg?" Jerome asked.

"Fiona and the kids loved it." Greg flashed him a brief grin. "I just wish it was long enough for the city to warm up."

"Don't we all."

"We've got a case." Greg's good mood was suddenly gone as he continued to speak. "They just called us in while you were coming down. It's something ugly by the sound of it."

"No rest for the wicked I guess."

Greg switched the sirens on and they were on their way.

* * *

 **=X=**

Thanks to the traffic, which was worse than normal due to the weather, despite being just January the second, a trip that should have taken twenty minutes or so took nearly an hour. At one juncture, while stuck short of an intersection, Jerome managed even to run to a nearby open shop and get them cups of hot coffee and was in and out before Greg could move the car. After last night's heavy snowfall, despite clearing machines being out in strength, there were still many streets that were yet to be opened, bottling up a lot of the city. The time at least gave the partners a bit of time to catch up after Greg's long overdue vacation. Soon enough, they did get to their destination, one of the many resident buildings in the area, marked by a small car-park of police vehicles parked in front.

Even for a bad murder, which by all accounts this was, that was excessive. This was the real world, not a police drama on the TV.

Paramedics, the coroner and forensics were in place in strength, which when all was said and done was a good thing. The pale and drawn faces of what might have been the first responders, not so much. Brown knew them – Ronny and Frank. Good, experienced cops both, with over twenty years in the service between them. They've seen some nasty shit in their time and the way they looked didn't hearten him.

"Boys." Jerome nodded at his colleagues. "What are we looking at."

Ronny looked green at recalling whatever waited inside.

"It's bad, Jerry." The Irish cop grimaced. "I've never seen something like this before and it won't be too long I see such a thing before I retire again. It's a pure butchery. Someone sick did this."

"It's like walking into a slaughterhouse in there." Frank added. "A neighbour smelled it first and when he got out in the corridor he saw a bit of blood leaking under the front door, which was when he called us."

"Lucky us." Greg muttered. "Shall we?"

They walked inside and soon found themselves on the fifth floor. A group of cops held back the neighbours, whose reaction was typical – from the expected shock to curiosity and fear along with the inevitable trouble maker or two who wanted to see what was what or just cause troubles for troubles sake.

When they approached their destination, the first thing Jerome noticed was the familiar coppery smell of blood and lot of it. The source was obvious as soon as they reached the door. It was in the corridor leading deeper into the flat, which explained how the blood got outside in the first place. There was a rug on the floor, which had absorbed some of it, slowing the spread a bit and buying the murderer a bit of time to get away. Jerome was thinking that, while his eyes refused to look at said source. He had to force his gaze upon it, at which point he blanched too. There was a twisted... thing made of bloody flesh. It looked like a demented Christmas tree decorated with the internal organs of at least one person; it was wrong and not just because someone got butchered in order to make this. It's very shape, once Jerome got a good look at it, well, it was utterly wrong. Something in the back of his head wanted him to shy from it, bringing atavistic sense of horror into his heart.

"Sweet Mother of God!" Greg mumbled beside him, thus bringing Davis out of his daze. He shook his head, looked away from the sick monument and finally took in the rest of the flat. There were forensic specialists scouring the place and Jerome didn't envy them having to carefully pass around the trophy to get in there.

"We need to find this bastard, Jerry!" Greg hissed and crossed himself.

"We will, buddy. Preferably before he can do this to someone else. Let's get to work."

* * *

 **=X=**

That afternoon, the two of them were stuck in the LT's office and they had precious little to show for their efforts. The weather last night, not to mention that this was the time just after New Year, ensured that a lot of people were home, recovering from their celebrations or simply keeping warm. No one saw on heard a thing – which was plausible, especially if the victim had been murdered first and drawn and quartered second – something that the coroner would enlighten them about once they were done gathering up and mopping all the pieces anyway.

"So you have, nothing." Lieutenant Barnes sighed. "The Commissioner has the Mayor on his neck ever since he heard what a mess we've got on our hands. That means that I've had the Commissioner and the Captain both breathing at my neck for results. If we don't get something soon, the Mayor might do his best to involve the Feds, too. It's going to be a complete circus soon. Please tell, me I understood you wrong."

The Detectives looked at each other. Until forensics and the coroner were done, there wasn't much more they could do. Due to the nature of the murder and the identity of the victim – a perfectly ordinary fellow who had no connection with the criminal world or any enemies anyone knew of, they were fast to exhaust their available options. There were a lot of uniformed cops scouring the place looking for witnesses, Silvester Parks had no family left and his colleagues had and neighbours both had only good things to say about him. What angles they had to look at with what they knew and currently had not been promising. Unless forensics found something it wasn't looking too good. On the other hand, it was likely that kind of sick man who did the deed made a mistake or two, it was just a matter of finding it. They had people looking at all mentally disturbed people living in the area and they would be looking into them too.

Unfortunately, besides the gruesome nature of the murder, there was nothing to go by at this point. Nothing, besides the obvious was out-of-place in the flat, no obvious clues so far. They fortunately hadn't heard about other such cases happening, though that was something they would be looking at too, not that they were back at the station.

"Nothing then." The Lieutenant grumbled when he didn't get a satisfactory answer. "Go find something then! Anything you need, within reason, you've got it. Find whoever did this before he could do it again!"

They went.

* * *

 **=X=**

That evening, they were at the coroner's office with nothing to show for a day of hard work. Lately there had been an upswing in violent and bizarre crimes all across the country, whoever if there was a case similar to theirs, no one had reported it anywhere they could easily access it in the time available. Checking with Parks' work and colleagues so far gave them nothing. No obvious suspects, nor motive. Questioning the neighbourhood was a flop as well – a lot of false signals that led nowhere, even if one of them might hold a hint of truth. There were a few people noticed on the streets in the area last night, all wrapped from head to toe in winter clothes making identifying them from description all but impossible. The crime scenes got swept for everything of use – like prints, hairs, etc... The later appeared to come exclusively from the victim, while without a suspect, the prints were of no much use, though once processed they would be checked against what law enforcement database existed, but that would take time.

The visit to the coroner wasn't of much help. An extremely sharp blades were used and a small mercy, Parks was already dead by the time he was taken apart. The perpetrator must have had experience with either butchery as a doctor or both. Possibly a butcher, surgeon or even a coroner – that at least was more than they had previously.

Unfortunately, by the time, The Butcher, as the media soon dubbed him, struck again, they were no closer to figuring out who he was or why he did it, besides obviously being crazy.

* * *

 **=X=**

 **Part 2**

 **=X=**

 **5 January 1994**

 **New York**

When Brown and Vargas got to the next crime scene, the place was already surrounded by a small and rowdy army of reporters and curious bystanders. The falling temperature in the evening did little to deter them. It was a struggle to go to the police cordon and all the way, reporters and ordinary citizens alike shouted questions or demanded that the police got off their assess and found the killer.

Jerome didn't really like the feel of the crowd – it appeared on edge needing just a spark to riot and that was to be avoided at all costs, especially as long his parter and he were in the middle of it. They did get to the cordon, eventually, yet the short trip strained both their nerves. The demands for answers and results got louder and angrier, people sullenly moved out of their way and glared at them, some even looked like they just wanted the tiniest of excused to do more.

"That was different." Greg muttered once they were in relative safety surrounded by their colleagues.

"They want results, can't blame them for that." Jerome whispered. He, however, could blame them for how they showed it. If they didn't get a break in the case soon, things could get even uglier. One would think that the cold would cool the tempers but obviously it wasn't working. At least this wasn't happening at the height of summer – the heat might have been enough to push the sullen crowd into outright rioting and then everyone would have more immediate issues than the insane murderer running around.

At least they didn't face any more excitement until they got to the lobby. The place was quite high class and rather tasteful. Jerome wasn't a specialist or anything, but even he could appreciate the old, warm feeling the furniture and wall panelling induced

"There are cameras in here." Greg pointed out.

"There's security too and not just an old fellow making a list." And there were cops already interrogating said security. "Go talk with them and find the tapes. With a bit of luck we would have the murderer's face by the end of the day." They just had to wait for the coroner to give them an estimated time of death for their victim to help nail when they should be looking. That might very well be the break they were looking for.

Thee crime scene was at the top of the building, where there was an enclosed warmed pool, perfectly usable even at the height of winter. Jerome guessed that the folks living here didn't have to worry about acting up heating. The place crawled with uniforms, the coroner's people and forensics techs running all over the place and this time around they actually had something useful to work with.

The pool was painted crimson, marking it as their crime scene. They did indeed had at least a bit of evidence to work with. There was bloody water splashed near the ladder leading out of the pool, complete with a place where the murderer had cleaned up himself. While there were no bloody towels or rags and thus an easy way to recover DNA, there had to be some in the pool, along with a lot of the victims. Besides, there were bloody markings of the murderers bare feet on the pale tiles surrounding the pool and that by itself could tell them a thing or two for him, perhaps help identify him once they had a suspect. Speaking about that, there was a forensics techs all over said evidence. With a bit of luck, they might recover DNA from the perpetrator's feet and considering the high profile case, Brown was sure that the Commissioner and the Mayor would help lit up a fire under the lab.

The one other thing Jerome noticed was that everyone but the coroner's people and a couple of the forensics guys did their best not to look at the pool. He couldn't really blame them. There was another... exhibit in there, at least as bad as the last one. This time, a large chunk of the victim was rigged to float over the water, displayed for everyone to see. Brown really hopped that the poor bastard was dead like the previous one before this was done to him.

"What do we have here, Smith?" Jerome asked the lead forensics tech.

"Evidence." The man gruffly deadpanned. He was a young – couldn't have been older than twenty five, and possibly the most tech savy of the whole bunch. He already had a baldness problem too, something Jerome could sympathise with. Smith waved a gloved hand at the bloody water splashed near the ladder. "There should be viable DNA there, though I can't promise you how fast the lab could process it. They're supposed to be expanded soon because nationwide everyone's getting swamped with samples waiting to be processed. We might get priority, I will ask, though it's out of my hands, really." He added something like not having contacts over there, but that was whispered so quietly, Jerome wasn't sure he heard it right. "Walk with me, Detective." Smith waved at him with his left hand, which thoughtfully wasn't covered with blood.

The forensics' tech led him past where his colleagues were busy fishing for viable DNA samples and up to the pool itself. "While the water is chlorinated, which isn't good for DNA, we will likely have something useful from where he cleaned up himself. If we can find whatever he used, we're golden. Now, for this mess." Smith waved at the pool. "I'm sure you've looked for similar cases, and while there has been an odd upswing of ritualistic murders lately, nothing quite this..." He struggled to find the right word, "Let's call it sickly fascinating, shall we? I've got a few of my guys back at the lab buried in every database we have, however as you might now, not everything is properly filed on computers and logged anywhere we can access." The tech grumbled. "Don't you Neanderthals know how much easier computers make our job!?" Smith shook his head in disgust. "Whatever." He grumbled. "As I was saying, I haven't heart of anything this sophisticated. By the way, good call on keeping the details quiet, the last thing we need is copycats trying to top up this shit."

"My thought exactly, though it was the LT and the Commissioner's call." Brown pointed out.

"I don't care as long as we don't have many more places like this to process." Smith looked at the floating thing created by the murderer and shuddered. "Anyway, I'm sure the coroner told you, this wasn't done by an amateur. Whoever it is, he has experience with both blades and expertly carving up meat. We're looking at ritualistic murders, at least the more sophisticated ones and trying to backtrack a trend. I personally don't buy that this was the second time our sick bastard struck, but its slow going. So far we don't have anything of use." Smith cursed quietly. "Do you have any bloody idea how many ritualistic murders we got just last year? It's at least as much as in the last decade alone!" He shook his head in disgust and continued droning on and one.

Jerome knew the man well enough to know not to interrupt. Sometimes, when he got this way, Smith got a eureka moment and the Detective could use one, anything really to get the murderer before he could strike again.

* * *

 **=X=**

Early next morning, they were all gathered in the LT's office – Vargas and Brown, the coroner, Smith and one of his people along with Sergeant Quin, who oversaw the uniforms gathering information at both crime scenes.

"Tell me we got a break!" The LT pleaded.

"We think so." Brown began. He offered the folder he held to his boss, whose hands snaked out, snatched it out and he was browsing it a moment later.

"Tall bastard, ain't he?" The LT asked. He was looking at the picture of their possible murderer, who was wrapped from head to toe in clothes. A large black trench coat covered most of his body, his hand had leather gloves and he was carrying a normal sized briefcase. Between a shawl, hat and glasses, the only thing visible of his face was a thin strip of skin just below the shades, which in itself was unusual, but not entirely unremarkable, considering that it was actually sunny during the days after the snowstorm that did its best to bury New York on the first. It was still way below freezing, which meant that the sun shining on the snow could be practically blinding in places and there were people out with shades in the last few days. That would make someone remembering their potential murderer harder – there was nothing really standing out with him besides the height, he was just over two metres tall and that was going to help a bit.

"Quin, did we get a mention for any big strapping lads seen around our first crime scene?" The LT asked.

"Indeed, at least a couple, who were possibly the same man. That was one of the reasons we believe this to be our guy. Unfortunately, he was wrapped up like a mummy there too so no real description besides tall and build like line breaker."

"Pity that. Smith?"

"We think we have some viable DNA and sent it to the lab. Further, my people are looking for any disturbed butchers or people with the relevant medical experience that are this large. We'll inform you the moment we find something. I mentioned it to Brown yesterday, our two cases might be just the newest two hits of our bastard. While we did have our own string of ritual murders in NY, as far as I know they're all solved so we might be looking at someone new to the city or who just got back after refining his particular 'skills' elsewhere."

"We're looking at that. More manpower could help with going over all kinds of records." Brown suggested.

"And we're getting it. Have we identified our new victim?" The LT asked.

"Not yet. There was no trace of an ID and a lot of the residents are supposed to be all over the country or even abroad for either work or pleasure. It might even be a guest." Vargas answered. "We've got people checking all the apartments just in case we have another murder on our hands. There have been surprisingly little protest so far, however, once more of the residents come back, you can expect some howling."

"Can't we helped. If there is another victim in that building we won't find out about it when it becomes rank." The LT declared. "Now, on another note, we'll have a press-conference at noon, when we'll disclose what little of our man's description we have. It will hopefully calm the people a bit once they know what they should be looking for. We'll have to say something positive, because as you might have noticed, it's getting ugly outside. The Mayor certainly did and he ain't happy. Is there anything else I need to know?"

"Not directly related, but one of my assistants had a mental breakdown after he helped gather and process the second body." The coroner reluctantly admitted. "To be frank, all my people are on edge. The way he butchered these people..." The old man shuddered. "I've never seen something like that."

"Let's hope we won't see it again." Greg muttered.

"Then go find the bastard!" The LT ordered.

* * *

 **=X=**

 **Part 3**

 **=X=**

 **7 January 1994**

 **Task Force Dagger HQ**

 **Fort Bragg**

Certain elements within the United States government and military had been aware that there was more to the world than most people believed. They learned that uncomfortable fact the hard way. It was always amusing when breaking a new batch of people to the secret.

"Gentlemen, Lady." Colonel Bernstein's scarred face twisted in a horrifying smile.

He looked at his newest victims. There were ten of them – all decorated and experienced special forces soldiers. Six from Delta, two Seals, one Ranger and one from a black outfit that was already read into what TF Dagger dealt with. Then there was the sole woman in the group – supposedly a brilliant young scientist, the brat of a general no less. They sat on uncomfortable chairs in the small briefing room looking at the raised dais where the Colonel stood. There were a whiteboard and a large monitor on the wall behind him and only the latter was going to be useful for this meeting.

"For decades, various unnatural accidents were dismissed as battle fatigue and later PTSD or simply delusions thanks to the effects of chemicals, no matter if deployed by enemy or friendly forces or perhaps even something the soldiers themselves had taken. All three excuses were liberally used in Vietnam. Considering the state of the US military back then, that was all too plausible for everyone concerned. It wasn't like anyone really returned with proof of their tall tales." The Colonel began. He pressed a button on his stand and the monitor came to life. It showed footage taken by the units sent to investigate the first accident that couldn't really be dismissed.

"Cold, hard evidence. It could make all the difference." Bernstein continued. "It was the reason why two accidents in Latin and South America respectively, opened the eyes of a lot of people. One was a rescue mission gone terribly wrong, with all but one soldier of the team sent to extract the hostages being hunted down by something. An explosion levelled a large part of the jungle and coincidentally ended that confrontation was hard to dismiss. You might have heard of it. Officially it was a freak incident – a relatively small meteor hitting the exactly wrong place at the wrong time and wiping out the special forces unit." The Delta operators whispered to themselves. Two of their unit were part of that team and didn't make it. While officially Delta Force as a whole accepted the explanation, there had been consistent rumours among their members that something very fishy went on in that jungle. At least one of the guys looked terribly pleased with that theory being proven right. The Doctor on the other hand looked pissed off at the cover up. She might need even closer watching than the Colonel anticipated.

"Unofficially, the sole survivor had a harrowing tale to tell and even if some had doubts about his mental stability after what he had been through, there was the unexplained explosion. It was in the kiloton range, not nuclear. Further, what he described being done to his team while they were hunted, well it rang bells of what American forces all over the world sometimes ran into – bodies sliced and mutilated in a chillingly familiar manner, almost exclusively in warm places during extraordinary heat waves. I know for a fact that at least a few of you had run into something like that." He nodded at the Deltas again. Bernstein had carefully read all their evaluations and as importantly, their debriefings over any mission they went on.

"Panama, '91." The most senior of the small group stated flatly.

"Indeed. We'll brief you about that later, when said survivor is available. He's working with us nowadays. The second accident, one that brought more physical proof, if of different kind, came from a Green Beret unit. They were busy training Columbian soldiers to better handle their cartel problem as a quiet part of the War on Drugs. On the face of it, what happened there was merely unlikely, not the strangeness Task Force Dagger got built to deal with. However, as you'll soon figure out, the rise of certain kind of accidents in the past two years changed that train of thought."

He pressed the button again and the screen switched to footage from other helicopters – Blackhawks this time, responding to a distress call from the unit in Columbia. What the Beret's reported was enough to scramble a unit built to deal with the same shit that happened in Latin America in '86. While they did find a target in Columbia, it was a very different one. The footage showed a clearing in the forest, where the training camp was. It was obvious from far away that something was wrong – the smoke and fires the helicopter crews saw and caught on camera were proof enough. To make things more difficult, there was some kind of interference that scrambled communications in the area after the Berets sent their distress call. That was one of the reason why what happened lit such a fire over TF Dagger's precursor unit.

When the unit arrived, they found a slaughterhouse. Most of the Columbian platoon had been already slaughtered along with more than half the US advisers. It was just that the enemy was different from accepted. Instead of the hunter they were after, the opposition was some kind of nasty, predators, never seen or heard before outside folk tales. It was smart, the size and weight of a large dog and not only fiendishly fast but had claws and teeth that could cut through flesh and to an extent bone with ridiculous ease. There was a large pack of them, too many to remain unnoticed until they ran into the soldiers and decided they were good enough to eat.

The new meat looked enthralled at the helicopters video. The Gunships and Blackhawks opened fire at the red figures dashing around the camp after they saw them swarm and tear apart a soldier who ran out of one of the more intact building and shouted for help.

"It looks like just some nasty unknown animal, right?" Bernstein grinned nastily and pressed the button again, this time showing carefully chosen parts of autopsy reports.

It was the scientist who got it first. "That's impossible!" She jumped up and exclaimed.

"Isn't it just?" The Colonel agreed. "That's what we're dealing with. Someone made those things and then field tested them against the Columbian and our boys. Someone, or should I say, something, hunted a group of our best soldiers for sport and it was as much luck as skill and tenacity that allowed one of them to survive to tell the tale. After those two instances, we began combing through all kinds of reports we already had with fresh eyes as well as sending teams to investigate anything particularly strange. What we found is most concerning and the reason Task Force Dagger exists."

* * *

 **=X=**

After giving some food for thought to the new people and releasing them in the tender care of the highest ranking NCO in the unit, the Colonel went to see the morning briefing. He went into the operation's room, where his XO and Intelligence officer sat nursing steaming cups of coffee. If TF Dagger had a weakness, it was figuring that there was an accident under-way and responding in a timely fashion. More often than not, by the time they got anywhere, everything was over but the screaming and they were stuck with clearing up the aftermath and figuring out a plausible explanation for the public at large. Necessary job, granted, just not their primary one.

His XO, the good man he was, had a cup of coffee ready for Bernstein.

"What is trying to ruin our day this nice morning?" He asked.

Charles McClain, his XO, tapped an open folder. "The latest from No Such Agency, the Christians in Actions and our friendly Fibies."

It was a day for mocking the various agencies then. Sooner rather than later, everyone working in Dagger had to find some preferably harmless way to handle the stress. Charlie's one was to mock every member of the alphabetical soup that was the US various agencies at every given opportunity. Compared to what the shooters came with on regular basis, the XO was practically harmless, so to speak. He was a trained and experienced commando too and even the knee injury that relegated him to desk work didn't make him any less dangerous.

"What's the bitter pill then?"

"We've got an upswing of Cult activity across the board complete with even more ritual murders. What happened in New York on the second and then the fifth is most notable." Matthew Koen, the Intelligence Officer, handed the Colonel a sealed folder. "It's just like in Brazil last summer."

Bernstein scowled at that, braced himself and unsealed the folder. The pictures of the two crime scenes didn't lie. He had seen a lot of nasty things since he became a soldier and most of that tended to pale in comparison to what Dagger had to deal with. This however, well, it rubbed him wrong for very good reasons. The images didn't lie. The way just looking at them felt wrong, well, that was a dead give away. Dragon Altars. Right here, on our own soil. God, that mess in the Amazon was bad enough." He turned to this XO. "Charlie, please tell me you got the ball rolling."

"The moment Matthew gave me heads up. I've sent the warning and request to authorise deployment in New York up the chain of command and just got here. I knew you were already on the way so I didn't bother sending someone to fetch you, sir."

"Good man. I'll make the same just in case." A few calls to certain friends in the Pentagon too.


	2. Chapter 2 Part 1

**Disclaimer: I don't own any of the X-COM or Mass Effect games, nor any other games, books or movies that might be mentioned or served as an inspiration of this story. It is not for sale or rent. I make no money of it.**

* * *

 **Chapter 2**

 **=X=**

 **Part 1**

 **=X=**

* * *

 **8 January 1994**

 **New York**

For a few minutes, Jerome was dazzled by the sheer scale of the slaughter, for there was no other way to describe what happened to all those poor bastards. A much larger version of the idol found at the other crime scenes took a central place in the office space and even being nearby, much less looking at it, made Brown feel sick revulsion. Eventually, he managed to push through and focus on his training and experience, both as a soldier and policeman and began looking at the crime-scene with the closest thing to professional detachment he could muster at the moment.

It looked like the whole shift in the office had been slaughtered, men and women alike.

"How many?" Jerome asked the coroner, who for the first time, looked pale himself.

"At a preliminary guess? At least ten, fifteen people. Perhaps a few more or less. We'll need to gather all the pieces to be sure." The old man blinked away a far away look from his eyes. "Detective, I don't have to tell you that it's highly unlikely that just one man, linebacker or not, could have done this. Even if he did something to incapacitate everyone so they wouldn't fight, flee or raise an alarm, the sheer amount of time it would have taken to do this..." He waved at the monument of flesh in the centre of the large room. "Preliminary, I could say that it was... built with the same skill as the other ones. Our murderer and his sick friends took their time both in making this and butchering the people."

"Should we worry about some kind of gas still being around or something?" They both jumped and looked at Greg who had been quietly muttering prayers ever since he saw what the victims were turned into. "What?" The short man scowled. "Gas is probably the most convenient way to incapacitate everyone. Perhaps something in the bottled water." He nodded at one of those machines where you put a large tube of water and could either heat or chill it on demand.

Brown looked around, carefully avoiding glancing for too long at the mountain of flesh and sure enough, there were two more he could see. It was perhaps a bit excessive for a place of this size, it might very well be worth it checking it too, however...

"We'll have Smith look it over, however there's no guarantee that enough people would have drank from there in the first place. Might have been it though." Jerome thought about it aloud. "A lone murderer would have needed a way to incapacitate practically everyone at the same time and fast at that. A group, however, could have risked taking their chances with a few people who hadn't been drugged through the water." Speaking about multiple perpetrators... He scowled at the very idea. Nothing until now even hinted at such a thing. Where did such a bunch of crazy bastards spawn from without any prior signs?

As if reading his thoughts, which he had the sometimes endearing and often frustrating habit of doing, Greg spoke about it. "A group carrying something like this successfully? They either had the Devil's own luck with them and given the circumstances, I won't discount that, or they worked together before and probably just escalated to this."

"We really need to lay on the nationwide ritual murders." Brown nodded in agreement. That additional manpower the LT promised and that began to materialize since yesterday was going to come in handy, though with this mess the Detective was half convinced that they would have the Feds crawling all over the place soon. For once, he didn't care for the interference, inter-agency pissing matches or who would get the credit. If the FBI's resources could prevent something like this from happening again, he would welcome them with open hands. However, until and unless such help materialized, this was his responsibility.

"Detective?" The coroner snapped irritably.

"Sorry, doc, I was thinking." Jerome apologized. "What were you saying?"

"Why do you think they did something this before in the US? I think we might have heard about it by now, even if details were kept under wraps for obvious reasons. They might have trained so to speak, abroad."

The Detectives stared at the old man for a long moment, then slowly nodded. That was an angle they haven't thought before and probably should have.

"I think you have a point." Jerome found himself nodding.

"The previous crime scenes – they were obviously messy." Greg took the idea and ran with it. "However, both you and the forensics guys repeatedly stress that whoever did it had experience dismembering stuff."

"That's obvious. I told you, the organs were retrieved intact before being used for that." He shrugged towards the idol at his back. "The blades used are incredible too – scalpel sharp at the least and the way they've cut into the bones, I'm using saws for such things, usually powered, yet all we're seeing here is blade-work!"

"What, like katana like those movies or something?" Greg asked.

When Jerome and the coroner stared at him, he shrugged defensively. "What? The kids like them, especially some Japanese cartoons my cousin got them on tape when he got back in the autumn."

"That's a myth." The coroner scoffed. "Katanas are great for cutting unprotected flesh, though they have issues with any kind of decent armour and this amount of bone? Just cutting apart our first victim would have wasted one, another for the second and for this? Nah."

"How do you know that?" Jerome found himself asking after dealing with the incredulity of where the conversation went.

"I was part of duelling club at High-school, then College and University. I did pick up a thing or two." The man reluctantly admitted.

"Cool." Brown nodded. He had always liked swords. While they were fucking impractical for ages now, there was just something about their shape... He shook his head. His mind it seemed was ready to grasp at anything to distract him from the job he was here to do. Jerome recognized the signs – he was the same after what happened in the desert. Anything not to think about...

He closed his eyes and took a few deep breaths to both calm himself down and concentrate.

"Jerry, you all right?" Greg asked after a few moments of awkward silence passed.

Brown opened his eyes and sighed. "Given the circumstances? Not really. Back to business, we have a bunch of maniacs to get. Do we have cameras and if we do, did our culpits disable them or get to the tapes?"

"I'm on it." Greg looked around. "I'm not seeing anything obvious here but that isn't saying much. There was a camera in the lobby at least but I don't think we had a small army of murderers simply waltz in through there. This is a big building with multiple entrances."

"Go find out." Brown suggested and focused on the coroner. "Do you have anything else of use right now?"

"Time." He waved both hands in an encompassing gesture. "Either we have one man who did the actual butchery who took his time, which I personally find unlikely, or there are many people with the same particular, shall I say, skill set, at play. It's all preliminary of course, I'll need to take this down and bring it back to the morgue for examination, run some tests too, which would take even more time unless I get more help." He grimaced. "I had another assistant suffer a breakdown, this time one working the second case. This thing..." The old man shuddered. "Anyway, I can't be sure until then. If I'm right, Detective, then we're in even more trouble than before."

"You don't say." It took all he was for Brown not to flinch at the very thought of multiple bastards able and willing to do something like this running all around New York. If they went on a killing spree, the sheer carnage they could cause before they could be hunted down... "I need to speak with the LT... First Smith I think. Doc, you do a great work, please keep it up and don't snap too, we need you."

The coroner chuckled at that. "It's good to know you young people still care. I've seen some nasty stuff during the war."

Brown didn't need to ask to know he meant WWII, when he had enlisted at the tender age of sixteen. They had swapped a few tales after getting back from the desert and talking with the old man did help him a bit in handling what happened over there even if he didn't know the details. He _understood._

Jerome found Smith at the far end of the office space, near the windows. The specialist was huddled with one of his people, talking and gesticulating wildly. Hopefully, they found something useful, instead of another headache.

"Smith, what do you have for me?" Brown spoke more sharply than he intended. This case had them all one edge, which while understandable, really, wasn't making their jobs nor their lives any easier.

"Bloody footsteps for starter. While the initial responders did make a mess of it, so far we've been able to isolate at least five distinct patterns. Or perpetrators all wore military issue boots and their number might be up and down a few depending if there were multiple people wearing the same number. If this was on soil, the deep of the footsteps would help us narrow it down, thanks to weight, which would be another marker to help both nail them down and figure out who we're looking for. In here however? That's much harder."

"So we're looking for at least five guys."

"Plus or minus a few. I have my people scouring the ventilation system to figure out if they used gas to incapacitate everyone. You might not have looked close enough yet," Smith said, which was true, "but we don't see any real sing of struggle. All the damage is from either the first responders or our perpetrators preparing the place to get to work."

Brown turned around and gave a good hard look at the bloody mess. Until now, his attention had been divided between trying not to look at the gut-wrenching thing the people were turned into and keeping his cool so to speak. Not particularly professional, but despite everything he had seen before, today did take the cake as far as horrors went.

Centre of the office space was opened by moving or smashing away everything that might have obscured the view for the idol. All kinds of stuff was piled away from a rough circle and just beyond it there were multiple desks used to dismember people, something that by itself indicated that there might have been more than one perpetrator at work.

"I saw you speak with the coroner, so if your mind hadn't switched on already, yeah, we had multiple people doing this. The cutting and building part too." Smith spoke with a biting tone. "And no, I can't give you any estimate yet on how long it took, besides the obvious – they worked during the night. Something you might find interesting, apparently no one came to check on all those people missing until this morning or if they did, they ended up as a part of that." He glared at the idol made of flesh.

That by itself wasn't much. If no one answered the phone, which they couldn't because they were busy being dead and cut to pieces, it was unlikely any family member or friend would have come here in the middle of the night. That said... "What about building security?"

"Ah, you don't know?" Smith stared at him.

"Know what?" Brown frowned. He remembered seeing a uniformed man at the desk downstairs and if that was all the security there was, it was very much possible he never really left the lobby. There were places where that and locks were all the protection people were willing to pay for.

"Downstairs is the day shit. One of them found this and called everyone. There's no trace of the night shift guys. They were either accomplices, part of this, dead and stuffed somewhere in the building or were paid to not show up in which case someone, like you, should speak with them."

Now, Brown outright scowled at Smith, though it wasn't the man's acerbic tone he had problem with right now. Granted, this was a bad case, possibly the worst the city had ever faced. That however, didn't excuse such a sloppy work. He should have known about the missing security people, hell when he thought about it, the Detective should have been told more than, it's really bad, come ASAP. He would have to lit up a fire under the asses of a few people, though considering the circumstances, he might have to be careful about how he went about it.

Jerome glared at the idol, which he blamed in part for all of this and he had the weird feeling that the mountain of brutalized flesh glared back.

After cooling down a bit and properly examining the crime scene, which did wonders, and not nice ones, on his nerves, Brown went outside to find out how the search for the missing guards was going on along with trying to track any sign of how the murderers entered and exited the building, which with a bit of luck might lead to a witness or them being caught on camera. The unknown fate of the security suggested that whatever surveillance existed in the building might be of no use, however that still left any cameras or people working all nighters around seeing something.

He found the sergeant in charge of the uniforms scouring the building and got a sit-rep from him – nothing of note yet. The same was true outside, at least as far as new evidence was concerned. The media circus and a gathering crowd, half-made by people working in the building, were getting rowdy already.

* * *

 **=X=**

 **Task Force Dagger HQ**

 **Fort Bragg**

As a rule, Colonel Bernstein made a point of speaking face to face with the new faces who looked like would remain with his task force. The Delta boys were easy and more or less what one would expect, though as a rule of thumb, they were a lot smarter than the public gave them credit for. They needed to be, especially those parts of the unit who were seconded to various black special operations groups, like the bunch that signed up for the ride, because someone else could do things wrong and got people killed for no good reason. What was left unsaid but implied, they were in for the challenge and chance to play with bleeding edge military hardware, which TF Dagger had access to.

Usually, handling the shooters was simple, or at least as simple as anything in the military ever was. The as if not more important, scientific support side on things however, that was a different beast. One thing that the people at large never seemed to get was that the most brilliant minds seldom worked for the government as anything but consultants, which usually meant you couldn't really put them to work with anything sensitive. Pay, the possibility to publish their results regularly and thus garner national and international renown with the products born from their minds. The security restriction, including where and when you could go and meet, all kinds of things really, fast piled up and made working for the government not as lucrative as many regular citizens seemed to think.

That left the great majority of clandestine research projects, which TF Dagger certainly was, struggling to find practically un-replaceable brilliant scientists. Many of those they already had working for them had various issues that kept them away from the public, legal, personal or other. A few were people recovered from foreign governments, often seeking alysium and those who could be trusted within reason made great additions to certain projects.

The newest scientist, a Doctor Carolyn Lam, with Lam being her mother's maiden name, were rarity. She was young, brilliant, if not precisely a genius level. She had to be in order to get a Doctorate on Biochemistry at the tender age of nineteen. According to her file she was working on her MD too, something that would by necessity take much longer, no matter her drive and skill. It was at that point that certain people suggested she got offered a place in TF Dagger. It wasn't that just that she was the daughter of a rising star in the air force – a certain general Landry, that by itself wouldn't have been enough to even have Bernstein even glance her way. It was her credentials, supposed open-mindedness, the fact that they did need a new bio-chemist, and well... He looked down at the file. Her mother had died not tool long ago and reading between the lines of the attached report, whatever got the woman might be up their alley. Landry was one of the people read in the program, he might suspect that something odd had happened to his divorced wife and decided to pull some strings to get his daughter into Bernstein's lap, where she at least in theory should be safer.

That was plausible, it was the same thing that his contacts in the known hinted at. At the face of it, it could work nicely, though once the woman had time to process some truths about the world they were living in, she might cause some trouble if she tried to dig in whatever got her mother... and that on itself could be an opportunity to cement her loyalty if she was worth it. Keeping American citizens safe from the unnatural was a large part of TF Dagger's job description after all. That and figuring out what the fuck was really going on – something they would need a genuine investigative branch for and recovering any useful technologies too, if they ran into the same thing seemed to hunt people in hot conflict zones.

"Colonel, Dr. Lam is here for you." Bernstein's adjutant, Lieutenant Myers, announced. The young officer often acted as a glorified secretary, personal assistant and whatever else he needed him to in order to free his time to do his real job, announced.

"Let her in."

Carolyn Lam strode in looking sharp in her business suit, though all the confidence and tasteful clothing in the world couldn't help her hid how young she appeared. She was just a kid, for Christ's sake. She certainly didn't have any business dealing with what TF Dagger often ran into, but then again, the same could be said even for hardened veterans. Besides, she might already be involved in their part of the woods anyway.

"Doctor, good morning. Please take a seat." The Colonel gave her what he hoped was a friendly smile. The truth was, that his outfit needed all the reliable personnel they could get their hands on and then some. "I understand you've been busy browsing the level one files we made available to you."

One of the big hooks TF Dagger had for all kinds of scientists and engineers, despite their darker than black mandate, was the fact that what they could work with here, well, they would be hard pressed to obtain somewhat safely if at all anywhere else.

"The things you've run into..." The young woman shook her head in wonder. "If I hadn't seen the reports and some specimens, I would have called this some kind of elaborate hoax. A part of me still hopes it is one."

The Colonel smiled in sympathy. "Just between you and me, Doctor, I often hope that one day I would awake and all of this would have been just some kind of elaborate nightmare. What do you think so far?"

Lam surprised him. "I'm in." She declared and conviction rang in her voice.

"That's great." Bernstein's smile froze on his face. While, at least a part of this meeting was to screen people who had second thoughts – not everyone, no matter their previous record, could handle what they were dealing with, such an eager agreement wasn't something that happened often. In his experience, it was often a reason to watch the person closely – as if he needed another one to keep a one eye on the general's kid. "May I ask, why? Everyone has their own reasons to be a part of this unit."

Lam took a few seconds to gather her thoughts. "First, there's the opportunity – where else could I study such fascinating and frankly impossible specimens? Secondly, now that I know at least a part of the truth about what's going on, I find myself unable to simply step back and pretend that all of this simply didn't happen and go on with my life as before. I believe I can contribute. I am in, sir."

That actually was the rough motivation of a surprisingly large number of people in the unit. Some couldn't handle the truth, others ran away, yet another group, well, they simply had to do something about it. Hopefully, Lam was genuine, the Colonel did get such a vibe out of her, though that wasn't foolproof. He had misjudged people before after all.

"Welcome on board, Doctor. Now, lets talk about..."


	3. Chapter 2 Parts 2&3

**Disclaimer: I don't own any of the X-COM or Mass Effect games, nor any other games, books or movies that might be mentioned or served as an inspiration of this story. It is not for sale or rent. I make no money of it.**

* * *

 **Chapter 2**

 **=X=**

 **Part 2**

 **=X=**

* * *

 **8 January 1994**

 **Task Force Dagger HQ**

 **Fort Bragg**

It was soon after he was done with Dr. Lam for the time being and began working through the morning's paperwork, when Colonel Bernstein got an unexpected visitor. In his experience, it was never a good thing when Captain Koen ran into his office carrying a folder. The man used the regular channels for almost everything, unless it either couldn't wait or needed to be delivered face to face.

"What's on fire today, Matthew?" The Colonel put down the pen and asked.

"New York and if we don't do something soon it really might be on fire." Koen walked fast to the desk and threw the contents of the folder on the desk, right on top of a bunch of acquisition forms.

Bernstein glanced at the pictures that spilled out and cursed a storm good enough to make an old sailor blush. The two accidents in New York his people were monitoring were bad enough, but this...

"I've got this from my man in New York. He just managed to get a few pictures of the newest site and sent them right to us."

"I'm glad I authorized you to sent someone in there." Bernstein said to no one in particular. "Did you alert the QRF?"

"To prepare for Dragon related deployment in New York, yeah. We're still not really clear on how to do it covertly in a major city in the US. I've already had Parker put the photos in the system. Our friends upstairs should be able to access them soon."

"I think covert might be a pipe dream this time around." The Colonel tapped one of the pictures with his index finger, it showed a flesh-crafted idol in all its sick glory. "I'll speak with the Pentagon and our friendly Senator. I want a team on the way the moment we get the green light. Prepare a briefing in case we need to use local assets too and begin working on a cover version for general consumption if you haven't already. We still might be able to keep the real details under wraps." Unless everything really blew up in our faces but if that happened, everyone would have other things to deal with.

Captain Koen saluted and dashed out while the Colonel grabbed his secure phone and began dealing.

"Major, get me General Granger on the line. We have a Case Green." Bernstein barked at the General's aide. It took a few precious minutes to find one of the officers overseeing TF Dagger, get him out of the meeting he was in and to a secure line, which gave time for the Colonel to examine the photos and what little Koen's agent had so far – the NYPD investigation into the newest incident was just beginning and it was a small miracle their fellow managed to get them this much this fast. It was just like that nasty horror in Brazil, though fortunately, this was only one of the precursor stages so with a bit of luck they still had time to avert a complete disaster.

"Colonel Bernstein, I understand we've got a situation." Granger's gruff voice sounded over the receiver.

"That's correct, sir. Case Green, in New York. There had been a few ritual murders that brought it to our attention. This could be worse than Operation Twilight, this time in a large US city. They are further along than the previous incidents implied. I'm looking at one of the primary triggers for the ritual we managed to prevent. It was done some time last night and found earlier this morning."

For a few moments there was only silence from the other end of the line followed by rapid taping on keyboard followed by a vile curse.

"Prepare for deployment and alert the Senator. Tell him I'll call him soon as well. I need to lit up a fire under a few people and I'll get you an authorization ASAP. Granger, out." The line went dead and Bernstein sighed in relief. Now for the political side of things... He dialled another number.

"Colonel Bernstein for Senator Moreau."

* * *

 **=X=**

 **Joe's Best PizzA!**

 **New York**

Freezing weather, snow, murders or anything else really, it couldn't really dampen the high intensity of life in New York. Roughly two kilometres away from the newest crime scene, there were just a few things that could tell a casual observer that something was wrong. There was nervous energy in the air and the people on the streets huddled in their clothes, though the latter could easily be dismissed as the cold. For someone new to the city, everything might even look normal. To Jerome on the other hand, he could practically taste the unease in the air. At least this far out, there wasn't a potential riot in the making. A few blocks around the new crime scene had to be sealed off and the last he heard, Riot Police was being mobilised just in case.

"That the place?" Greg asked.

"It sure looks like it." Brown confirmed after glancing through the window.

It was one of the many small places making fast food dotting street corners in the city – in this case, pizza, which in his opinion was the best of the lot. The sign and the spelling they were told to watch for did match – PizzA written with large red neon. The place looked packed with people eating as well as drinking tea and coffee. It looked surprisingly high class, couple of steps above most of the competition, more like a small family run restaurant than a place to get a bite on foot and scamper away fast to get on with your day.

The reason why they were here was simple, eventually the uniforms did find most of the missing night shift guards. Four of the five were murdered with blade weapons and it looked like they were hit before they knew what hit them then they were dumped in an empty office, with the door locked behind. The was no sign of the fifth. A careful examination of the primary crime scene found no trace of him, which given the state of the bodies there wasn't saying much, however they didn't find any part of his uniform and the clothes of the other butchered people were discarded near where they were dismembered. That meant he was either killed and left somewhere else in the building, which was still being scoured from the basement to the top for more victims or evidence, or he was missing, in which case he could be either a witness or an accomplice. Lacking other solid clues to pursue, the Detectives along with two cars with uniformed cops went to see where the man lived – which was supposed to be in the residential building above the eatery they just reached.

Their man of interest was Mat Mezzini, who according to the day shift security, lived next door to his brother, who apparently made some of the best pizza in the city.

The number of clients Jerome could see packed into the small restaurant told him that they might not be too far off the mark as far as the food was concerned.

"Brother or flat, what do you think?" Brown asked.

"One of us speaks with Joe Mezzini, while the other goes to check if there's anyone home. We don't have a warrant yet." Greg reminded him.

"True, however we do have a reason to believe that Mat might have not even made it to work last night and we'll see if we can get a permission from his brother to check if he's all right. It's thin, I know, however given the circumstances..." Jerome was uncomfortable with cutting any corners – doing so just gave the guilty a way to slither away from getting their just reward when they got to their trials. On the other hand, right now he was more concerned with finding the ones responsible before they could strike again and then sicking SWAT on them. He would worry about trials and everything they entailed later.

Greg politely didn't mention that the possibility that Mat didn't get to work at all or was a part of the crew that did the killing was conjecture at best. They simply didn't have anything better to pursue that didn't already have either the uniforms or the additional manpower supplied by the LT and Commissioner going over in hopes of something useful showing up.

One would expect that after what happened at the office at least, there would be tons of useful evidence. Technically there was and in the long run it might be what broke the case. However, processing it all and making it useful, that would take time and meanwhile, there wasn't much actionable stuff they had to go on with.

"Joe first, I think. You take the uniforms and make sure if there's someone in the flat, they won't be able to get away before I get there."

They got out of the car and separated, with Greg waving the four cops to follow him. Jerome made his way into the restaurant and walked to the counter, where an attractive young blond woman was taking orders.

"Detective Brown, NYPD. I need to take with Joe Mezzini about his brother. There was an accident at his work last night."

"Mat? Ohmygod, did something happen with him?! He's..." She began to babble.

Perhaps she had a crush on him, may be even a girlfriend. From the picture Jerome had seen, Mat was attractive enough and well built – more than enough to give him a decent odds with the ladies.

"I can't really talk about it right now. I need to speak with Joe Mezzini, Ma'am." Brown gave a standard response.

"Joe's in the kitchen in the back." She pointed at a door mostly hidden by a stand keeping pieces of sliced pizza warm. "Just go in."

He did. The kitchen was not particularly large, the heat was nice after the biting cold outside and the place was a madhouse as could be expected given the number of clients outside. Many preferred freshly baked pizza instead of the already cooked pieces on display – he should know, he was one of them after all.

"Joe Mezzini?" Jerome had to shout to be heard over the loud conversation of the four people busy cooking and the sound of the stoves and furnaces.

"Who is asking?" A short, stocky man wearing white cook's clothes shouted back from the far end of the room. He was leaning about a large pizza and liberally sprinkling it with spices.

Jerome did the same introduction he gave the woman at the counter and added a request to speak privately, preferably somewhere more quiet. At first glance, Joe appeared concerned, however nothing our of the ordinary – just what you would expect from someone gets such a visit if they had no idea whatsoever what was happening. So he was either somewhat decent actor or was in the dark.

Joe led them through a short corridor into a storage room, that was full with stools and tables that probably were placed outside when the weather was warmer.

"What happened, Detective? Is Mat all right?" Joe had the right amount of concern in his voice.

"That's what I want to know too. There was an incident at his work last night and he is currently missing. Did he leave as usual? Did he appear nervous or something?" Jerome asked.

Joe frowned. "You know, last night he looked more cheerful than usual. He's work isn't the most exciting – it's not like there's something to look up for keeping an empty building safe beyond the pay check at the end of the month."

Well, well. Brown's ears perked up at this. Was it possible that they hit pay-dirt with this Mat Mezzini character?

"I thought that he might be seeing some girl that works late nights over there lately. He's been in an excellent mood the whole week and I was happy for him – Mat's been depressed for the last couple of years."

"I see. Perhaps he does. Did he meet any new people, perhaps foreigners lately?" The timing did fit neatly too.

"I don't think so. For the past few months he's been getting out with his colleagues more often and I was glad his depression appeared to be petering off." Joe said.

Not with the day guys, he wasn't, though given their schedule – practically the same people worked days or nights, without switching unless someone needed a specific week day free to get something done, that wasn't surprising. Mat might have been going out with his colleagues, true enough, though they were no longer around to ask and it would take time for someone to inform their families and begin asking questions about their supposed good friend, Mezzini. What happened, Jerome suspected, was that Mat got into contact with the people responsible for the murders and they somehow enticed him to help. He wondered if Mezzini knew what he really got into or if he would end up as the next victim if he wasn't one already.

"What kind of accident?" Joe suddenly asked. He stared at Jerome for a long moment, then paled. "I know you!" He exclaimed. "From that press-conference about the Butcher! Is Mat all right?!" Mezzini begged for reassurance.

"We don't know. He might be a witness to another murder and in danger. May we check if Mat's home and all right if no one answers the door? Does he live alone?" Brown inquired.

Joe nodded frantically and began checking his pockets. "I have a spare key for his flat!"

"May I have it then? Please wait here until we check and make sure its safe."

A few minutes later, Brown was on the fifth floor, key in hand. Greg and two of the uniformed cops were near the door. His parter had sent the other to cover the fire-escape.

"We got a way in and a permission from the brother. It might be just enough if we find something of use inside." Brown showed the key. "Which door?"

"Fourth on the right side." Greg nodded towards their target.

"Let's go see what's what. Be careful, Mat might actually be involved. The brother said he had been very excited this past week. It might be just that he found himself a nice girl or..." He didn't need to elaborate, nor he want to particularly think about the mindset needed to enjoy such a butchery.

They got to the door and took positions beside it in case someone hostile and armed was inside. They all had bullet-proof vests, one of the small up sides of the increased crime rates lately, which in turn led to more money being shoved at law enforcement to combat it, but those wouldn't be able to stop anything but a pistol round or two and perhaps not even that depending on the calibre and range.

Jerome nodded at Greg to get ready and rang the bell. "Mat Mezzini? NYPD, we have a few questions."

When no answer came after he called and rang again, Brown used the key, which worked like a charm and unlocked the door. He had a hand on his service weapon, and drew it before he opened the door and entered. The first thing he saw was a dark corridor, something that was solved thanks to a flashlight from one of the uniforms, until Jerome could hit the light-switch. The corridor itself was unremarkable – just like dozens if not hundreds such he had seen since becoming a cop. It had a nice rug, it was painted in warm pastel tones, it felt pleasant. Not at all like the home of a murderous maniac, which admittedly, Mat might not be.

They piled inside and checked for occupants, of which they found none. The place continued to appear like a nice home. There wasn't much furniture, however all of it was in good repair and as if chosen to fit everything else. At first glance, there was nothing out of the ordinary. Was this a bust?

"Jerry, come into the bedroom." Greg shouted.

There was something odd in his tone, that made Brown dash to see what his partner found.

* * *

 **=X=**

 **Part 3**

 **=X=**

 **Mat Mezzini's apartment**

 **New York**

A large bed, made up and covered by a blue blanket, two night-stands on each side, a wardrobe to the left and a desk with a small TV on it next to the wall beside the door. Nothing unusual, again. Greg stood in front of the opened wardrobe looking at something inside.

"What did you find, buddy?" Jerome asked.

"Come and see." Greg moved aside to make room

The first thing Brown saw was hanged clothes, though they were shoved aside to make it easier to see what was at the bottom of the wardrobe. There was an open sack there and the hilts of two wrapped up... were those short swords or something, were sticking out. The really weird thing was that they were actually glowing _through_ the towels they were wrapped with.

"What the hell?" Brown blanched and took a step back, pulling a startled Greg with him. "For all we know those things are radioactive or something."

"Weird blades, I think. Reminds you of something we're looking for?" Greg shook his head and turned to look at his partner.

"It might be some party thing or something for all we know, but still." Jerome agreed. Those might be toy lightsabers with grips like real swords or something. Or they might be something much nastier and less fun.

"There's only one way to figure out without waiting for forensics to come here, especially if they have to suit up for this." Greg pointed out.

"Don't remind me." They were on the clock too. The time between the murders, not to mention the scale escalated. "Get back, you do have wife and kids to think about if this is something that can make us glow in the dark too." Jerome shoved himself past his protesting partner, put on his gloves – the leather ones meant to keep his hands warm in this weather and carefully unwrapped the weapon on top. It was a short sword, all right. It was straight, there was no sheathe and the blade looked like it was made of some sort of glowing crystal of all things. Its point was kinda dull, however the blade's edge itself – it was sharp enough to slice through the towel as if it wasn't there while Jerome unwrapped it. He had no idea how that was done in the first place without cutting the fabric to ribbons – very, very carefully was his best guess.

"I think we need to find Mat and have a long heart to heart conversation with him about his choices in life. Call it in, Greg. I want this place torn apart and anything of interest, found."

"My thoughts exactly. I just hope it will hold up in court."

"Stop the murders first or it will be all academic anyway."

A call to the station ensured that there will be forensics people on the way as soon as someone was free and that everyone will soon be looking for Mat. In other news, the Feds had got off their asses and were taking over the case, though they would be working with local law enforcement. They wanted to speak with him as the lead Detective too, which meant Jerome would soon be making his way to their local headquarters.

"Let's see if we can find anything about Mat's new friends. Carefully, mind you!" Jerome ordered. He would be leaving once the forensics people arrived and hopefully he would have something more than the blades to show to the Feds. "Greg, come, we'll have a word with the Mezzinis. They might have some idea where Mat went to meet his new friends."

They actually didn't know they had anything useful about such a location, Mat had been vague about where he went out and were very distressed about the whole thing. On a more positive note, at least once Joe had heard his brother call a taxi with a destination somewhere near the docks and that was some time after his improved mood. That was a possible point of interest that had to be checked even if it turned out it had nothing to do with the case – probably something for the FBI to do. They at least would bring more sorely needed manpower.

They were just done speaking with the family for the time being, when the benefits of having the Feds on the case materialized in the form of a pair of stuffy very special agents and more importantly, a van chock full with their forensics people who arrived to take the apartment apart. Brown was glad to let them have it and headed to meet with their boss.

* * *

 **=X=**

 **Senator Moreau's office**

 **Norfolk, Virginia**

Michael Moreau was a busy man. With a bit of luck and a lot of work, by the end of the year, his place in Congress was all but guaranteed in no small part due to his ties with the military, which in turn led to making some very useful contacts on Capitol Hill. His way wasn't the most usual in politics, but who cared, when it worked for him? Support, in the form of contacts and good words opened a lot of doors that otherwise would have been closed to him for years to come.

Those were some high points of his association with certain parts of the military. On the other hand, given his relatively low key position, he could act as an excellent go between certain parties. He wasn't one of the big names everyone looked at and remembered, that currently gave him a degree of personal freedom that would soon vanish if his next jump on the career ladder was successful. While he expected to continue to be involved in certain projects, that would hopefully be in less hand's on fashion in the future or perhaps more, depending on how things would turn out.

However, right now, politics was somewhat a secondary concern, a means to an end really. Michael was one of the people fully briefed on what Task Force Dagger dealt with and it had been one of his personal nightmares that one of these days, they would have to operate in a large scale within the US. That day might have just come if what Colonel Bernstein was as bad as the man feared.

In the United States, deployment of military units in what many would say was a law enforcement role, was a big no-no outside of a few very well defined circumstances. In different states, that threshold might vary a little bit, at least as far as the National Guard was concerned, but a unit of the actual Army like Dagger? That was a great can of worms. Making it possible without letting it be known why they were really there? That would be a political nightmare at best, which included reading a lot of people in certain secrets who they might use for their own gain at best and at worst, might try to play with what they really shouldn't.

Thinking about it, as a part of Congress, given his ties, Michael might very well be one of the people who would have to actually make that possible and shoulder the blame if it everything went down in flames. In comparison, right now, he was about to act as a glorified messenger and go-between. The Senator grumbled to himself, picked up the phone and lit up the fuse that would hopefully make Dagger's potential actions legal.

Moreau and everyone involved knew that the procedures that they currently had in place were far from sufficient if everything really went to hell, however they lacked both the political capital and direct threat to the US to show as a justification for something more. What was happening in New York might just change that and then, well what the future held was anyone's guess.


	4. Chapter 2 Parts 4&5

**Disclaimer: I don't own any of the X-COM or Mass Effect games, nor any other games, books or movies that might be mentioned or served as an inspiration of this story. It is not for sale or rent. I make no money of it.**

* * *

 **Chapter 2**

 **=X=**

 **Part 4**

 **=X=**

* * *

 **9 January 1994**

 **New York**

A press-conference twelve hours ago and the media being helpful for once, ensured that Mat Mezzini had his face plastered all over the news, evening and now morning papers. In anticipation, a small army of cops and FBI agents sat at the phones, ready to receive and compile tips about his location. That was a useful precaution, because soon after the news broke, the call centre set up specifically for this case got swamped. There were hundreds of calls and that was just in the first hour. Separating the few genuine gems from the chaff took time and a large map plastered on one wall of the room with pins showing where Mezzini got supposedly sighed. Different colours designated the reliability of the information based on the feeling of whoever received a certain call about the one making it. Soon a patter emerged. While as expected, there were calls showing him all over the place, even out of the city, which was of course possible, of a more immediate use were those that placed him at a place where he might logically be from what little his brother knew – there was as string of sightings near the docks. It was a high traffic area, trucks and vans of all kinds passed through there – it was a major shipping hub after all, one that not only supplied the sprawling metropolis of New York but the state and beyond.

Despite everything various government agencies could do, it was ridiculously easy for something or someone to slip through and lose themselves within all that incoming and outgoing traffic. It was a matter of either placing so many restricting and checks that it would hurt commerce and thus the businesses of too many people or drying to patch up a leaking dam with insufficient supplies and manpower.

So far, it was obvious what was deemed the lesser evil.

Calls received during the night helped narrow the area of the docks to be searched and soon after sunrise, a SWAT unit and a small army made of FBI agents and police descended to that part of the docks. Patrol cars established checkpoints, all but strangling traffic and over a hundred of policemen and agents began scouring the warehouses in the restricted area. While that was going on, Brown and his partner found themselves squatting with the SWAT guys, busy putting on better armoured vests than they were issued as detectives – those had more in common with what he used as a soldier and the plate at least could stop a few full calibre rifle bullets at medium range. Closer – it was a toss-up really, depending of the quality of the vest, the kind of bullet and angle of impact.

Hopefully, none of them would have to find for themselves how well their protection stood up to gunfire. Besides, their targets preferred bladed weaponry, however, no one wanted to assume they didn't have guns as well.

Gunfire and angry shouting came from the west, startling everyone.

"Fuck, we need help!" One of the Feds shouted over the radio. "Man down!"

Then someone opened with an automatic weaponry – an AK variant, Jerome had heard more than enough of those back in the army to recognise them in his sleep.

"Roll down, now! You two, hold on and stay behind us!" The SWAT commander ordered.

The armoured van they were piled in roared to life and suddenly accelerated. Moments later, multiple sirens announced that everyone was converging on the fire-fight.

"Someone talk to me. What are we dealing with?" The SWAT commander, David Webb, shouted over the radio channel, which got more frantic by the minute.

"Multiple shooters, rifles and sub-machine guns. They're at the warehouse on..." A wet splat followed by a scream of pain interrupted the report.

As they drove closer, the shooting intensified, with the sound of pistols and shotguns all but drowned by automatic fire. The van drove around a corner and bullets pinged off its armoured hide. Jerome looked his partner in the eyes – Greg had a wild and incredulous look on his face. This was America, New York, damn it, not some South American hell-hole!

"Multiple hostiles, warehouse at the end of the street. I can't go further without going trough multiple police cars!" The driver shouted and slammed the brakes, forcing the van to come to a sudden halt, thus nearly spilling everyone from their uncomfortable seats.

"Out, out, out!" The Webb shouted and opened the door, displacing to the left and going low. The rest of SWAT did the same, springing for cover, with the Detectives following suit.

They emerged into a slice of hell that could be straight from the news of the Middle East and South America if it wasn't for all the snow. Police cars and few vans blocked the way. They had their doors open and the occupants had either ran way or out and taking cover. Brown was glad to see that most of his colleagues were smart, hugging the engines, which could actually stop a rifle bullet.

That was the only good news. Glancing over the hood of the SUV he took cover behind, Jerome saw multiple people down on both the street and side-walk. At least one was a fellow cop, with another suited figure that might be a Fed. There were at least two civilians caught in the crossfire, one of whom was gone – the woman on the pavement missed a chunk of her head.

Down-street, behind a bunch of vans and pickups, he could see the enemy – they were firing as if bullets were going out of favour, yet... Jerome cursed. There were a few of them using wild suppressive fire, but that all it was – suppression. Beside them, there were others who took aimed shots. That by itself was more than enough to tell him those weren't ordinary gangers – those didn't know how to shoot right even when their lives depended on it. In contrasts, the way those were acting, it betrayed training, even if there was more to be desired. The suppressing fire was outright wasteful, yet more than enough to keep everyone but SWAT with their heads down.

"Who the fuck are those guys?!" Greg exclaimed after he scampered beside Jerome.

"Might be ours." Brown got back properly under cover. He glanced at his Bereta – it was most inadequate for this shit. He should have picked up something heftier from SWAT's van. In fact, that was what he was going to do. "Greg, my boy, we need bigger guns."

His partner dared to glance over the hood too and immediately got back when a burst turned the front shield of the car in Swiss cheese.

"That's a good idea, but I have a better one – let's let SWAT do their particular magic."

They were already engaging – the familiar and comforting sounds of M-16 variants and MP-5's joined the fray and soon made the enemy focus on them as the greatest threat.

"Oh, I think we'll let them do the heavy lifting but we can give them a hand."

* * *

 **=X=**

"Fucking pigs!" Many Cruzon shouted. "Shoot the bastards!" He followed his own suggestion and aimed his AK at a pig going for the trunks of his car and likely something more useful than a pea-shooter. He sent a few bursts through the side of the car and smile when he saw a body spill on the ground a moment later.

Many, who cut his teeth fighting Communist rebels in his home, Columbia, before he saw the light and the money and joined the Cartels, was determined to make his patrons proud. They wanted to control the drug trade in the continental US, no matter who got in the way – rival organization, local organized crime, gangs or even the police. To make that happen, he had more product that he knew what to do with, soldiers, with the experience in both the real army and in the cartels' own conflicts as well as enough weapons to start and win a small war. While not everything they had even just in New York was in this distribution centre, however, there was enough product and equipment that he would rather fight it out so he could get out as much of it as possible.

Many certainly did have enough people for it – more than twenty soldiers along with a bunch of gangers who were little more than cannon fodder. At least they would be useful enough as a screen when it came time to go in, re-arm and prepare to make themselves scarce. Or at least that was the plan in case they were found out. Cruzon didn't know how the pigs found him, nor did he care. As the Americans loved to say, that meant he had a target rich environment.

"Lui, Tiko, go get heavy weapons! We'll hold them for now!" Many ordered. SWAT was already here. He sneered. They didn't know what they were dealing with. "Nina, get some liquid courage for those." He nodded at the gangers.

Nina, a slim, raven-haired beauty, who was a vicious murderous bitch under her doll like exterior, simply nodded and sprinted into the warehouse followed by his two soldiers.

The Americans were good – as he knew they were. However, he was trained by their special forces, a bunch of cops, they simply didn't measure up, especially when his patrons let him train his people before they sent him to America.

Suppressive fire soon pinned down the police, who lost more people trying to rescue their wounded as well as civies that got in the way. So far, Many had lost just two of his men and about a third of the gangers.

"Boys, I bring gifts! Two hundred bucks for every one of you who sticks a pig today as well as free speed for the week!" Nina's lulling voice carried over the roar of the fight. "The best of you gets a night with me!" She encouraged the gangers and beckoned couple of them to come get the small blue vials with speed and distribute them along their buddies and thus risk getting picked off by the pigs.

Many smirked at the bitch's promise. Those poor bastard didn't know what a night with her truly entailed.

"Here, boss!" Lui came out first, PKM in hands and boxes with ammunition in a bag over his back. He shoved a second bag in Many's hands, spilling AK clips out.

"Good man!" Cruzon grinned. "Where's Tiko?"

Lui grinned back and nodded towards the warehouse.

Tiko was out, complete with an armoured vest, helmet and a grenade launcher in hands.

"That's what I'm talking about. Get someone to spread the ammo. I want three men with me to get up-armoured and armed, then we send in another group. How's loading going?"

"We'll need ten more minutes."

Tiko opened fire and turned a car into a burning wreck, thus sending the mangled corpses of two cops flying.

"The pigs won't last that long." Many laughed and waved a few of his men to join him inside.

* * *

 **=X=**

On the upper floors of a warehouse close to the cartel occupied one, a group of men prepared to leave. Their leader's foresight of choosing this place as their lair paid out big. Without the criminals in place to distract the police, they would have had to fight their way out and that would have endangered their holly mission. Instead, the great Dragon would feed in the blood spilled in the area, just as anticipated. The worshippers bowed at the flesh idol in the middle of the room as it pulsed with power and drank the blood and souls of the people dying on the street outside.

* * *

 **=X=**

 **AN: In Predator 2, there was practically open warfare between gangs and police in LA, ten years after the first movie so about 1996-97. In this world that won't be an isolated accident but a trend with all kinds of criminal organizations, cults and worse causing trouble all over the globe. For the US, the problems are just beginning in New York. Here the search for the murderers accidentally stumbled in what's a precursor to what the Predator 2 protagonists in LA would face over the next couple of years leading to a certain hunter's visit.**

* * *

 **=X=**

 **Part 5**

 **=X=**

 **9 January 1994**

 **New York**

An already bad situation went straight to hell in a hand-basket, when the fucking gangsters brought out heavier weapons. Some kind of machine gun opened fire, making sure that SWAT was pinned down good and as if that wasn't bad enough, the bastards had a grenade launcher too.

Brown and his colleagues found that the hard way – his only warning was an awfully familiar thump, followed by an explosion and even more screams before his mind could register what was really happening. Part of it was the sheer shock of it all. While he was no greenhorn, it's been a few years since he got out of the army and this was New York, damn it! The sheer stunned disbelief of this happening right in his home slowed him down even further, all the while people got shot around him.

In that context, the explosion actually did one good thing – it shook Jerome out of his funk and he let his training finally take over. He shouldered the carbine he appropriated from the SWAT van, exposed his head briefly above his cover to took a stock of the situation and got back into cover while processing what he saw.

Whoever had the grenade launcher was smart enough to stay behind the cover of the multiple vans and trucks parked at the front of the warehouse where the enemy was positioned. Brown could see a two distinct groups of the bastards – one was what he expected from gangsters – most of them were firm believers in the spray-and-pray school of shooting, thankfully. The others however, they moved like trained soldiers – taking cover, using suppressing fire and aimed shots, the works. Even the wilder suppressing fire died out by now and they were acting as if they fully remembered their training now that the initial rush of adrenaline was gone.

That was bad news. In theory, those people didn't stand a chance – there were thousands of cops in the city alone, along with multiple SWAT units. In practice, New York was a big city and while catching them eventually was a given – after this everyone and their uncle trice removed would be gunning for them, the enemy seemingly had the fire-power to blow through anything the local law enforcement could bring to bear on short notice and then make a run for it and attempt to disappear.

No matter their intentions, if they had any besides making a fight of it, it was going to get uglier before the situation got resolved. A belief soon proven correct when Jerome heard another thumb and a second car turned into an expanding fireball. Jesus, what the hell were they shooting with or what was in that vehicle?! This wasn't Hollywood, damn it! Thankfully, there was no one in the blast range, yet the explosion had an effect – every cop in the vicinity instinctively hunkered down.

The screams of the wounded and dying, bullets tearing into the ground and sending chunks of asphalt everywhere, the familiar sound of hot lead piercing metal, it all brought back memories and not good ones. For a moment Jerome was back in the desert, fighting for his life, then shots hitting car he hid behind nicely focused his mind and kicked him out of his minor PTSD episode.

From his location, Jerome couldn't see the second most potent threat, the machine gun. By the sound of it, there was at least one van between him and its nest. He glanced behind his cover again that vehicle then at the weapon in his hands, took aim and sent a few burst through it at a height that should have hit anything at the level of a car engine on the other side. Only then did he dislocate as his training insisted he did and sprinted towards a nearby pickup abandoned by its owner. All around him, the fire-fight was subduing somewhat, with only the SWAT guys and the cops who arrived later having some spare ammunition left. In this kind of shoot-out – a magazine in the gun and couple of spare ones, they could be gone in a couple of minutes. Side-arms weren't meant for this shit anyway.

"Jerry, ideas?" Greg skidded over the wet asphalt until he slammed his back in the engine block next to Brown.

"Help SWAT, get our wounded to cover and wait for backup, but we need to take out that grenadier first." A third vehicle went in flames, a mini-van this time. A few moments after the explosion, something began screaming, the poor bastard.

"That's easier said than done." Bullets slammed into their cover and Greg leaned over the front of the car to sent a burst from his MP-5 downrange before getting back into relative safety. "Christ, but there are a lot of the bastards over there."

"No shit?" Jerome snorted.

"We need backup now, damn it!" Commander Webb's voice screamed from nearby.

He had to be speaking with dispatch over the radio and hopefully more SWAT units were rolling down already.

"SCORPIONS!" Someone roared from the gangster's lines and the incoming fire picked up.

"Stick it to the pigs!" Another enthusiast shouted.

"Fuck, they're rushing us! Shoot them!"

The Detectives looked at each other and then sneaked a look over their cover. Sure enough, a bunch of the gangers were laughing and charging in the open, heedless of the danger... which was less than it was a few minutes ago. A lot of cops were down, others were either taking care of them, suppressed by the enemy who knew the fuck they were doing or simply out of bullets.

SWAT on the other hand was mostly intact – they had longer ranged weapons, better training, didn't get caught by the fire-fight by surprise and most importantly, they did have armoured vests that were rifle fire resistant. They opened fire almost as one and gangsters began falling. The Detectives added their own fire-power to the mix and to Brown's astonishment, his first target took a burst to the chest and just kept coming. He was already moving his aim to the maniac running next to the blonde madman he just shot when his mind registered that despite his bullets hitting and penetrating – the immediately visible blood that erupted from the chest of his target confirmed it, the man simply stumbled back, shook himself and raised an Uzi and began spraying bullets at anything that moved.

Jerome sent two burst through that bastard's buddy, who thankfully got down, then took a more careful aim and splattered the brains of his original target. Whatever those were high on, it had to be the good stuff.

Soon all the charging madmen were down, in couple of cases behind cover, demonstrating that a few of them found their common sense in the last possible moment. A lull in the fighting followed while everyone reloaded. It took Jerome a moment to figure out that the trained enemies were no longer shooting. He dared take a good look at their position and sure enough, none of them was in sight.

He got back behind the engine and shook his head. No honour among thieves, drug dealers and crazy gunmen it seemed.

"They used those bastards as cannon fodder to distract us while the rest of them disengaged." That was not something you saw every day.

"Really?" Greg dared take a good look to. "Huh, you're right. What now, Jerry?"

"Let's get our guys behind cover, we're in no position to rush them." Brown didn't add that it might be for the best if SWAT actually did so, because if those people barricaded themselves well and proper inside the warehouse, it would be a pure bitch to dig them out.


	5. Chapter 2 Parts 6&7

**Disclaimer: I don't own any of the X-COM or Mass Effect games, nor any other games, books or movies that might be mentioned or served as an inspiration of this story. It is not for sale or rent. I make no money of it.**

* * *

 **Chapter 2**

 **=X=**

 **Part 6**

 **=X=**

* * *

 **9 January 1994**

 **New York**

No one was shooting any more and that was almost worse. It let everyone took a stock of the situation and that left them listening to the screams and moans of the wounded and breathing in the stench of burning flesh with nothing to distract them. Cops warily glanced from their cover, here and there, suited FBI agents did the same along with a few of the braver civilians.

"SWAT, cover the warehouse, everyone else, go get the wounded to cover! Ambulances are on the way!" Webb's voice snapped like a whip in the sudden silence. For a heartbeat nothing happened, then everyone able to move, scrambled to obey, now that they suddenly had a direction hammered in their shocked minds.

Approaching sirens – both police and ambulance, could be heard approaching. Helicopters, again police and this time, news soon hovered over the docks and below them, the battered and dazed survivors moved to take stock of the man made disaster they stumbled in. Jerome saw SWAT troopers dash from cover to cover, always aiming their guns at the warehouse, meanwhile, his other colleagues along with few of the civilians ran to drag the wounded behind nearby cars. The first man the Detectives reached was an FBI agent. He was just a kid really, might have been Irish, if his ginger hair and pale skin were anything to go by, though the latter might have been because of the three nasty holes at the right side of his chest – rifle bullets had sliced through his bulletproof vest as if it wasn't there. Brown cursed and applied pressure as well as he could, while helping Greg drag the poor bastard behind nearby van.

"He needs an ambulance, man." His partner muttered.

"He needs a hospital, yesterday."

They passed by a cop who had taken a high calibre bullet to the face, that practically blew it away, making him impossible to identify by sight alone. A woman sat right next to the rear tire of the van clutching her bleeding shoulder. She was pale as a ghost and shaking, from both cold, blood-loss and shock.

"God damn it, this doesn't happen here at home!" Greg voiced Brown's own thoughts.

"I have him go check on her." Jerome nodded towards the woman.

Another set of hands wasn't going to help – all he could do without proper supplies was try to stem the bleeding as well as he could... speaking about supplies... "Check if she has spare tampons or something else that can help stem the bleeding, both for herself and the other victims."

"Tampons?!" Greg exclaimed, incredulous.

"That's a story for another time. They work." Jerome nodded.

That was when the gangsters make themselves known again. A pair of powerful engines roared to life and the sounds of crashes and crumpling metal came from down-street. SWAT opened fire only to be answered by a punishing hail of bullets.

"Bastards are getting away!"

That infernal grenade launcher thumped again and another explosion shook the street. All Jerome could do was listen to one final exchange of fire and then the crashes and whatever the gangsters were using to displace was getting away.

"Christ Jerry!" Greg exclaimed in disbelief.

"What the fuck were those?!" A SWAT member taking cover behind a near car, from where he could see what just happened, exclaimed.

"Someone just declared war I think." Jerome muttered, still finding it hard to believe what happened. Shock? Denial? He probably suffered both.

The only silver lining of the enemy escaping for the time being was that emergency services could flood the area without getting shot at. In the next few minutes the place got swarmed by paramedics, their ambulances and every cop in the city not busy chasing the bastards responsible for the battlefield.

* * *

 **=X=**

 **TF Dagger HQ**

 **Fort Bragg**

The fire-fight was just over, when the news about it broke nationwide, complete with aerial footage from a street that would be at home in some third world hell-hole being torn apart by a civil war. All Colonel Bernstein and his command staff could do was watch in impotent fury and stunned disbelief.

"Me thinks we should have sent more people and equipment."

"Those aren't Dragon worshippers." Koen shook his head.

"They're bad enough." The Colonel spat. "Send Dutch to me the moment he's back."

"You're sending him too?"

"What do you think, Major?" Bernstein nodded at the TV. "Inform me if there's anything I need to know." He went back to his office, where he had more of the paperwork needed to keep his task force up and running to go over.

A coffee cup and a stack of filled forms later, Bernstein's adjutant announced he had a visitor.

"Let him in." The Colonel shouted, not bothering to use the intercom this time. He placed his signature upon a requisition form for more special equipment, to account for the stock taken by the unit en-route to New York, when the door opened and a tall, very broad-shouldered and muscled man walked in.

"Dutch." Bernstein cracked a smile when he saw the man. If at all possible, he looked even more ripped under his uniform. A pair of clear blue eyes sparkled with amusement when they took his position behind the desk.

"Getting soft in your old age, Colonel?" Dutch rumbled in his not so faint Austrian accent. His amused smirk made the scars on his cheek look almost alive, like a slithering, jagged tattoo made to have that effect. That wasn't the only sign from that encounter with the alien that Dutch barely survived. Whatever the thing used to blow itself up when it lost, it caused every single hair upon the Major's body to gradually fall off and nothing he had tried was able to regrow it so far. All things considered, the man was lucky that so far there weren't any other side-effects. For all anyone knew, the energy released could have given him, could still give him for that matter, super cancer or something equally nasty.

"We can't all be running around having fun all over the place like you, Dutch."

"There's a reason you'll have to drag me kicking and screaming to get my next promotion." The giant of a man chuckled.

As a special forces Major, Dutch could barely justify going out on missions with his people. Once he became a light bird, which was years overdue as it was, he would be relegated to either support as command and control away from the shooting or more likely, a stint behind desk, probably at the Pentagon. That was a fate that Dutch used every trick in the book and favour he was owed to delay for as long as possible. Ordinary, doing so would have killed his career, however, the man's skills, successes, reputation and the fact that so far he was the only one known to have engaged the aliens, codenamed Predators and defeated one, gave him slack almost no one else in the military enjoyed.

"We'll manage it one of those days, Dutch."

"And I'll never forgive you for it." The large man sobered. "We have a problem, I hear."

"New York and I'm not speaking the gang war they just stumbled into." The Colonel unlocked one of the drawers of hid desk and retrieved a folder. "Come on, sit down and read this." He offered it to Dutch, who grabbed it and began skimming the contents.

"Those again?!" He exclaimed.

"In New York of all places." Bernstein nodded.

"I'm not seeing any progress on what little we recovered from the Amazon."

"The language is super weird or so the boffins tell me. We had another one hospitalized, bleeding from the eyes just last month so figuring that one is on a slow burner until we find more specialists we can read into the program and find a safer way to handle those tablets."

"Fuck me." Dutch shook his head. "And I used to think that after aliens, nothing could surprise me any longer."

"No such luck, Major. I have a job for you."

"New York." It wasn't a question.

"Yes. After what happened earlier today, the locals' law enforcement will have yet another big problem to worry about. We both know that a bunch of gangsters, no matter how well armed or trained are not in the same league as this. Get Charlie Team, go reinforce our people and make sure that the Dragon's ritual isn't complete."

"Colonel, I've stressed this before, we need more people to help with investigating stuff. We're too busy reacting and running trying to put out fires, reacting when we should be acting."

"That's the second reason I want you there. Given your background, you're one of our best people to look for new recruits to handle that. Keep your eyes open – police, FBI, I don't care. If you see someone who catches your eye, call me. We'll run a background check and if it pans out we'll approach them."

"Finally!" Dutch exclaimed.

* * *

 **=X=**

 **Part 7**

 **=X=**

 **9 January 1994**

 **New York**

Jerome stood in the cold, paying little attention to the chaos surrounding him. Everyone alive and in a need of a hospital was evacuated already, though there were paramedics all over the place treating scrapes, abrasions and the odd glancing hit that merely brushed the skin. Four dead cops, three civilians and more than twenty people in critical got hauled away, with some of them unlikely to make it. In contrast, there were fifteen dead gangsters, most of them from the spray and pray group that figured out it was a great idea to charge in at the end of the fire-fight. Brown walked besides one of their bodies, which were yet to be picked up by the coroner's people and examined it. It was of a young Latino man with enough tattoos visible on his face alone to open his own tattoo studio.

"A bloody Scorpion." That was another surprise – the ink didn't lie. The Scorpions were a small gang involved with drug running, the usual extortion, racket and the odd murder. Decidedly small time. What did one of their bunch had to do with this?! Did they get overhauled into something more dangerous and everyone somehow missed it?! Just to make sure, Jerome went to check the other bodies and sure enough, five of them had tattoos on their faces proudly displaying their allegiance. Jerome would have to wait for the coroner, however he was sure the others would have similar ink as well. That mystery partially solved, the Detective walked closer to the front of the warehouse, which was still in the process of being cleaned up and secured by SWAT – that would be his next stop in fact.

Soon he found what he was looking for – a different body, this one slumped next to the car he used for cover. A discarded AK variant laid on the ground beside the corpse, which was of a fit man in his early thirties. No visible tattoos on this one, his hair was short, almost shaved, something else that might imply a connection with some military in the not so distant past, though a simple haircut was far from conclusive. Half the dead Scorpions had their heads shaved and that certainly didn't improve their shooting skills or sense of self-preservation.

He was about to head into the warehouse, when he saw an open sack discarded beside a car nearby. Jerome would have dismissed it as something for the forensics techs to bag and tag once they got unleashed upon the crime scene, when something caught his eye and he went to give it a closer look. There was a small glass vial with something bright blue inside. Some new synthetic shit perhaps? The Scorpions were really changing, and not for the better, if they had contacts who could produce and supply something like that.

Sure enough, the bag was half-full with bunch of more vials. Now that he knew what he was looking for, Jerome could see a few empty ones scattered all over the place. That potentially explained the insane charge – the gangsters were as high as he suspected them to be.

Brown called a uniform to come watch over the bag to make sure someone didn't displace it, either by accident or not. At the very least the Drug department and the DEA would be very interested in this find.

Soon after he got into the warehouse, Jerome found at least part of the reason why the gangsters panicked and opened fire when they saw the police coming in the area in force. The place had been turned into a small arsenal, one that was partially evacuated by the criminals before they ran for it. In one corner there was an area closed off by transparent plastic walls. Inside, there was a typical drug-repacking station. A few packets dropped in the haste littered the floor, covering it with white powder. All of this because they accidentally ran into a drug operation?! Jerome cursed. And to think they still had their ritual murderers to catch, however even if the bastards were in the are, they would have made themselves scarce during the battle. However, if he could still find their lair, it might hold evidence about their identity, motived and where the hell did they went.

If they were ever in the area in the first place...

* * *

 **=X=**

When Brown went back outside, he found the LT, the Captain and Greg having a shouting match with a suited man – an FBI agent, presumably. This one, Jerome hadn't met. He made his way to join them, though he took his time hoping it would be enough for them to calm down.

No such luck. The reason for the argument was clear – it was the old as time blaming game. Well, technically that pie was for the Feds to eat – ever since last night, they ran the hunt for the Butcher with NYPD merely providing assistance and manpower.

"Captain, Lieutenant." Brown greeted. "It looks like we had the bad luck to run into a drug operation and our presence scared them."

"We knew nothing of this or we would have taken precautions!" The Fed snapped.

Yeah, like bringing all the SWAT units in the city. That should have been enough.

"Neither did we." Brown looked at his superior officers. "Right?"

"If Drugs knew about this, they never mentioned it." The LT shook his head.

"As far as I know, there was no major known operation in this part of the docks." The Captain added.

"This is incompetence, pure and simple!" The Fed glowered.

Ah. Whoever he was, he was the one most likely to get the blame unless he successfully deflected it, Jerome was sure of it.

"I'm sorry to interrupt this fascinating discussion, but don't we all forgetting something?" Greg butted in. "We were out here for a reason."

"After this, any suspects we might have had would have run." The Fed didn't look pleased at the attempt at changing the topic and tried to dismiss it as not relevant any more.

"While that's true, their safe house might still hold useful leads." Jerome pointed out.

"Then go find them." The man snapped in a tone that made Brown want to scream at him. Bloody bureaucrat!

The Captain was on the same opinion it seemed and went straight in the man's face demanding that he treated his people with all the courtesy they were due. The situation deteriorated from there.

* * *

 **=X=**

Meanwhile, in a nearby building, a mountain of pulsing and twisting mountain of bloody flesh began to melt into a pool of viscera. Its purpose fulfilled and fully charged, the altar fulfilled its purpose and used all the gathered energy to bring its patron that much closer to awakening, consuming all the offerings in the process. By the time a pair of cops checking for civilians hit by straight bullets found it, all that remained was a pool of dark liquid that contained the remains of multiple willing sacrifices.

That energy transfer didn't remain unnoticed. Far to the south, deep below the waves of the Gulf of Mexico, something sleeping stirred. In its slumber, it felt one of its rivals coming closer to awakening and its dreams were enough to awake some of its lowest minions and sent them to scout and prepare the way.

* * *

 **=X=**

That night, the atmosphere in New York was sober. The city was practically in lock-down, with NYPD and FBI scouring the place for both the Butcher and the gangsters who thought it was a great idea to start an open war. They had managed to fight their way through two police blockades and reach another warehouse district where they abandoned their vehicles and heavy weaponry only to make themselves scarce along with the drugs they managed to retrieve.

A massive manhunt was forming and by the time the sun set, it was an open season for the Scorpions and their allies.

It was in that atmosphere of uncertainty and fear, that a High Priest of Dragon leaned over a map of the city and began browsing through a stack of documents, wondering what his next target must be. He began to chant in a guttural, ancient language not meant for human vocal cords, seeking divine inspiration. The metropolis was ripe with strife that fed his powers and in turn his patron through him and he was determined to increase it tenfold.


	6. Chapter 3 Parts 1&2

**Disclaimer: I don't own any of the X-COM or Mass Effect games, nor any other games, books or movies that might be mentioned or served as an inspiration of this story. It is not for sale or rent. I make no money of it.**

* * *

 **Chapter 3**

 **=X=**

 **Part 1**

 **=X=**

* * *

 **10 January 1994**

 **New York**

When the United States military wanted to move, it moved. Transporting two units of TF Dagger to New York, covertly mind you, was done with practised ease. They set up shop in a DOD storage facility that was currently holding crates with old office equipment awaiting disposal of all things. Twenty experienced soldiers were ready and eager to go, yet all they could do was check and double check their equipment while their tech specialists monitored police and FBI frequencies as well as the local media.

This was why Dutch and a few other more experienced operators pushed for a more diverse mission and personnel to be included in Dagger. They were practically useless without a target and when all was said and done, too often they arrived just in time to clean up the mess only when everything was over and all they could do was execute a cover-up. In fact, they were one of the factors feeding an ever increased circle of conspiracy nuts all over the globe. Of course, at least some of those people actually saw the world more clearly than the rest of the population and it was for the best if they weren't believed. The last thing anyone needed was a widespread panic. That was the last thing New York needed, the place was already a powder keg looking for a spark.

"Boys, give me something." Dutch addressed the boffins.

Both of them were terribly young – graduates from MIT who did breeze through basic and thus got the Colonel's attention as just what the doctor suggested.

"We've got raids on known Scorpion safe houses all over the city either in progress or being planned. Most SWAT units in the city are committed with just couple being kept in reserve. The same is true for everyone from FBI with advanced combat training. What we don't have is anything new about the cult." Martinez reported.

Despite his family name, he was a blond, green eyed and pale skinned young man. On the other hand, his friend and colleague, McGraaf had pitch black, darker than night skin and had the build of a linebacker, not something usually seen in someone who for all intents and purposes was a nerd, with capital N. Often enough, Dutch has heard those two discussing Dungeon and Dragon games of all things.

Certainly not his usual crowd, however he had nothing bad to say about their competence or dedication so he really didn't care much what they did with their free time. Usually. That discussion about somehow enhancing weapons to plus five to kill Dragon for sure if it showed its ugly mug still exasperated him to no end.

"Who is in charge of the investigation? Who has most experience with this case and is our cover ready?" Dutch asked.

"A courier should bring us the document soon. We're supposed to be some kind of covert Federal Task Force created to quietly deal with the rising epidemic of ritual murders all over the states." Martinez's fingers flew over the keyboard of his computer.

One of the reasons why they set up shop in this building was the hard line connection it had with the various federal networks. Of course, that very feature meant that its status as a storage facility was nothing more than a useful cover.

"Let's see... FBI's running the case now, but that's a recent development. Until a couple of days ago, it was headed by a Detective Jerome Brown, NYPD. I'll bring up his file if you want, sir."

"Do so. That name sounds familiar." Dutch mused. He was sure he had heard it before and considering that he had seldom been to New York and never had dealings with the police there before that left it as work related, something that merited a closer look at that man.

"Ah here it is. Good cop, various commendations, nothing out of the ordinary in his NYPD file."

"Cross-check him with our files." Dutch suggested.

"He's a naughty boy then?"

"Or plain unlucky."

The image on the screen changed to a log-in screen for TF Dagger's servers and soon Martinez was searching about their person of interest.

"Bingo." A restricted file popped up. The specialist put in his username and password, which were enough to gain him access to this particular file.

Brown's military file was usual enough, until a certain incident that ended his career.

"I see." That had sucked. There was currently no reliable way to deal with Jinns and other intangible entities. Covering up their appearances was never a clean thing. More often than not it meant painting people either as mentally unstable or preferably as being exposed to something that made them hallucinate and some times kill each other. That's what happened with Brown's unit – officially they got exposed to some nasty chemicals and the rest was history. "Arrange me a meeting with the Detective. He sounds like our kind of guy."

TF Dagger needed trained and experienced investigators on board, otherwise they would continue stumbling in the dark and arriving just in time to bury the bodies.

"Prepare a file with what we know of usual Dragon operations and preferences." Dutch ordered.

"Aren't you moving too fast on this, sir?"

"Specialist, you've watched the news and read the unfiltered reports. We're already too late and playing catch up."

* * *

 **=X=**

It was only noon and Jerome already felt like a week old corpse. After the fuck up yesterday, he spent most night answering questions and filling up the paperwork that came with a fire-fight involving a cop. By all means, Brown along with most involved people should be getting a day or two off at least and taking things slowly while incident got investigated. However, given what was happening, New York was in all hands on deck situation so the usual procedures got rushed. Besides, for once it was an open and shut case. There was no doubt that the shooting was good and justified.

That still left him stumbling like a zombie in a need of a pot of coffee. He got a steaming hot cup with black goodness thick enough to keep his spoon upright. There was enough caffeine in there to bring the dead back to life, just what he needed.

"Brown, come here. There's someone who wants to speak with you." The lieutenant shouted over the mostly empty floor. Most cops in the city were out on the streets, often backing up SWAT on raids.

Jerome looked up at the LT's office and saw a tall, broad shouldered stranger who looked like he had more muscle than sense. The man made a linebacker look small and fragile. For a moment, his sleep deprived brain thought that this was one of their perpetrators come to surrender, gloat or cause trouble, then shook his head at the crazy thought. Brown grabbed his coffee and went to meet the newcomer.

"This is agent Black. Agent, this is Detective Brown." The LT introduced them. "He is part of a task force looking into ritual murders all over the country."

Now, that made Jerome perk up and wide awake. He noticed that the bald man carried a metal folder, a small case really, the type he had seen a handful of times in the army meant to carry classified documents.

"You've seen something like this before, haven't you?" Brown asked.

"In a matter of speaking." The man patted a folder he was carrying. "Can we speak somewhere more privately? Just me and the Detective, I'm afraid, lieutenant." Black shrugged apologetically. "It's not my call."

Jerome raised an eyebrow at that. There were just couple of other people on the whole floor and why the LT didn't need to know? Or what he didn't need to know for that matter...

"Use my office. I'll go get myself a cup of coffee and take my time." The Lieutenant gave Jerome a pointed look that meant they will be having a talk soon.

"What's this about?" Brown asked after they got in and closed the door.

"We've encountered similar murders before, though not in the continental United States." Black unlocked the folder offered it to him. "This is need to know, you understand. I want you thoughts on what we have compiled so far."

"You know who is responsibe? Why didn't you give us the name before?

"In a matter of speaking. We are aware of the organization, unfortunately their membership list is something we lack."

Jerome grabbed the folder and opened it. The images inside made his stomach queasy. They were familiar all right, even if the first creations of human flesh were less sophisticated than what he encountered. The Detective eventually noticed the background. It looked like... "Is this a jungle?"

"The first time we encountered this cult it was in Brazil, the Amazon to be precise."

"Cult?" Jerome repeated. "That actually makes a twisted kind of sense. Those are kinds of altars, perhaps effigies then, aren't they?" He tapped a picture almost identical to what was done to his first victim.

"Correct."

"Why do we learn about this just now?"

"There are some unusual consideration surrounding this case. Just like what happened to you in the desert."

Brown stiffened at that and narrowed his eyes dangerously at the larger man. "I'm not sure what are you insinuating, agent Black."

"We both know that there was no chemical spill that caused your people's death, Sergeant."

Brown closed his eyes. He knew that deep down, however going on with the official version, hell, he wanted to believe it. It was easier.

"This the same shit?"

"As in unusual and not supposed to exist? That much is the same. It's not something that we can just announce without looking insane or causing more trouble than its worth it."

"What are we really dealing with?"

"The Cult of Dragon. We believe that they are trying to either awake or release an imprisoned entity they worship, the said Dragon. So far we have no idea if it's an actual honest to God dragon or not. What they make with pieces of dismembered people has actual physical and tangible effect over people. You've been around and must have noticed how it feels being near those things. It tells us that those aren't just run of the mill crazies murdering people for shit and giggles."

"God damn it. What else?"

* * *

 **=X=**

 **Part 2**

 **=X=**

 **10 January 1994**

 **New York**

It wasn't anything the federal agent brought Detective Brown that ultimately broke the case open. It was good old fashioned police work, well forensics in this particular case.

"Brown, we've got them!" Smith ran into the Homicides' pen waving a thick folder.

Jerome looked up from the documents he was reading, which were the little that federal agent left into his possession. It contained all kinds of useful information... if they were hunting cultists in the jungle. There was very little that he could see as potentially useful in a place like New York. It didn't help that every cultist in Brazil had died in the end so besides trying to see if they had any known family in the States and then check if they were in New York, that particular angle was a bust.

"Do tell!" The Detective perked up and closed his own folder.

"You know we recovered some bloody prints from the last crime scene!" Smith grinned. "They're in the system!" He all but sprinted to Jerome's desk and handled him the folder.

Brown opened it and frowned. One of the cultists was a low level member of the Italian mob who got out of prison six months ago and as far as anyone knew, he had never left the city. The other was a drug dealer with an outstanding warrant who hadn't been seen lately. The man was Columbian, like the Scorpions, which explained how the cultists knew where that heavy protected warehouse was in the first place. No coincidence then but a set up.

Jerome glared at the picture of the man who got a lot of people killed yesterday. He might have also be a connection with South America that explained how the other cultists got here in the first place. On the other hand, their Italian mobster might be connected to the still missing Mat Mezzini even if all their efforts so far didn't indicate any known connection between anyone in that family and organized crime of any stripe.

"Good work, Smith. Do you have anything else for me?"

"We're done processing all other prints – no hits. They've been careful enough not to let anything obvious pointing at where they ran to next. We're still combing through everything we recovered, however..." Smith shrugged.

"Then this should be enough. Thanks, Smith. I have some calls to make." Jerome grabbed the phone handle from the corner of his desk and nearly sent it crashing to the ground in his haste.

* * *

 **=X=**

After that yet another press-conference held just after cops hit all know informants and known haunts of their new targets, it was a combination from snitches pointing fingers and information received through calls that led them to new areas to search. This time around they were ready for war just in case it wasn't a coincidence that the cult laid low next to a Scorpions' warehouse, however due to the locations – residential areas, they went in quietly. The only visible presence was the increased number of patrol cars everywhere, which was no different from the rest of the city. In contrast, there were multiple vans full with SWAT units and uniformed cops armed and armoured in a similar vein. Both plan clothes FBI agents and their own special units were driving around the neighbourhoods, ready to pounce.

Shortly after midnight, when it had been snowing for more than an hour already, one of the FBI teams patrolling the neighbourhood got lucky and noticed their Italian suspect – Dio Gregori. It was luck more than anything else, though the fact that he was the only one walking the streets at that hour and weather did help. Gregori was loaded with groceries, presumably bringing them to his buddies, which prompted everyone to trail him and prepare for an assault once they located the cultists.

Twenty minutes of nervous waiting later, Gregori walked into a dark residential building.

"How do we proceed?" Brown asked the supervising FBI agent in charge of his own little group. They were all in the back of a Fed's van, armed to the teeth.

"Follow him, find the correct apartment and storm it before they could strike again. If practical, we'll get a warrant for the place, we do have a judge waiting our call."

No one commented on that – it was going to work only if the agents trailing Dio could find the right place without getting made.

"We're not staking out the building then?"

"For all we know, he might be out to bring in a midnight snack while his friends are busy slaughtering people." The Fed shook his head. "Usually I would be all for gathering more solid evidence with all that entails but in this case?" The older man shook his head.

At least this one was more reasonable than the supervisor Brown had to deal with at the docks. He head that one got recalled to Washington to answer a few pointed questions.

* * *

 **=X=**

Special Agents Helena Newton and Victor Vance got out of the car and walked towards the door where their suspect vanished hand in hand. They leaned into each other and smiled, doing their best impression of a lightly drunk couple that was coming home for some fun. They did stumble a bit for show and as an excuse why it would take them a bit longer than expected to find he right key and enter, hopefully a cover enough for Helena to pick the lock.

They got inside and in front of the elevator's door just in time to see it stop on the seventh floor of the ten floor building.

"Stairs?" Victor asked.

"Stairs." Helena nodded. It was much quieter that way and the last thing they wanted was to find themselves face to face with the maniacs dismembering people while stuck in a metal box with nowhere to manoeuvre and no cover.

Up until the fifth floor they noticed nothing out of the ordinary, however when they were on the stairs to the sixth, a whiff of coppery scent came from upstairs. The agents looked at each other and called it in.

"We can smell blood. They're not just hiding in here."

Vance narrowed his eyes at the ceiling. "Do you hear that?" He whispered.

Helena frowned and concentrated. It was so quiet she wasn't sure if she really heard it or if it was her imagination playing games. "Is that chanting?"

A young child began to cry upstairs and the sound got just loud enough to hear. It was chanting all right, however it was weird – the words... they made Helena's brain itch.

"Hold position. Backup is on the way." The agent in charge ordered.

Both the crying and chanting steadily increased in volume. The agents looked at each other again and nodded. They weren't waiting – for all they knew those monsters could be killing the kid next. They drew their service weapons and began sneaking up the stairs.

With the sounds coming from upstairs, Helena almost missed the whisper leather behind them. She whirled around as fast as she could and opened her mouth to shout a warning. Warmth exploded in her chest and all that left her lips was a wordless hiss that got swallowed by the chanting. She saw a figure cloaked in shadows despite the steady blue glow coming from the blade piercing her chest. The agent blinked and she fell. There was no sight from the one who stabbed her, just heat spreading through her body. She tried to warn her partner then she fell face first on the floor and the world ended in stars and scorching heat.


	7. Chapter 3 Parts 3&4

**Disclaimer: I don't own any of the X-COM or Mass Effect games, nor any other games, books or movies that might be mentioned or served as an inspiration of this story. It is not for sale or rent. I make no money of it.**

* * *

 **Chapter 3**

 **=X=**

 **Part 3**

 **=X=**

* * *

 **10 January 1994**

 **New York**

Two minutes, it took that long for Brown's van to reach the building and screech to a halt when the driver hit the brakes. That was more than enough time for all hell to break lose. Another SWAT truck along with two SUVs chock full with Feds were already parked outside with multiple unmarked cars arriving by the minute. Shots and shouts echoed over the street, people got up and switched on the lights in the surrounding buildings, yet their target remained ominously dark.

"Fuck, without time to plan, it always sucks." The SWAT team leader cursed while they were piling out of the van. He was immediately proven right when shots and gunfire echoed from the building in front of them. "Go, go, go!" He shouted and sprinted towards the entrance.

A group of Feds in tactical gear got in just before them, then a piercing scream came from upstairs followed by the sound of breaking glass and a SWAT member crashed on the hood of a SUV. One look was enough to tell Jerome the man was dead – even if the fall didn't do it, the bloody axe buried in his ribs would have killed him before he hit the ground.

"The Hell's happening up there!?" Greg exclaimed.

More shots and frantic hits followed and instead of answering, Brown ran up the stairs on SWAT's heels. They saw nothing out of the ordinary until they reached the third floor, just dark stairways. There they found three bloody bodies being tended by a frantic cop with another slumped figure being dragged down by a Fed. The shooting above them intensified and someone let out a piercing war-cry that sounded more like a beast's roar than anything that came from a human's throat. The SWAT point-man helped the Fed bring down their wounded comrade and once the stairs were free, the rest of the unit sprinted up.

On the fourth floor they found two dead cops taken out with throwing knives it seemed. There were bullet holes making the walls and doors, yet no trace of the target. It was only on the fifth that things became grimmer. Three SWAT members laid in crumbled heap there with a fourth being stuck to the wall between the fifth and sixth with a sword. There they found the first enemy casualty – a thin figure covered from head to toe with shimmering black leather or something that sure looked like it. It was hard to tell because other units had riddled it with bullets more or less shredding it.

SWAT's only reaction was a string of quiet curses as they ran past their fallen colleagues. On the sixth floor, they found another fallen SWAT member that meant the leading unit had been all but wiped out. He was placed near the elevator along with the bodies of the two FBI agents who entered to scout the building. Both were taken out with blades too.

This was ridiculous! Even in close quarters, you didn't simply wipe out a SWAT units using swords and knives! According to the files, it hadn't been that bad in Brazil, however there the army took no chances and deployed a lot of fire-power and had the luxury of not getting into close quarters at places they hadn't already shot up to hell. Here and now? That wasn't an option.

"We need more people." Brown told the closest SWAT member.

"They're one the way."

"Contact!" Someone shouted from above and the shooting resumed. A gurgled scream of pain got cut short, a shotgun boomed twice then there was a silence for a moment. "Man down!" Another voice sounded.

They finally got to the seventh floor and ran into the Fed unit.

"God damn it!" SWAT's team leader spat. The last of his colleagues had been on point and now he laid decapitated in the middle of the corridor. Beside him, a Fed was on the ground with a blade stuck in his gut while another was trying to stop the bleeding while the rest of the agents were covering all approaches.

There was chanting coming from the right side corridor and that one was covered in unnatural darkness that swallowed up the light from the tactical flash-lights attached to the Fed's weapons before it could reach the end.

"We need to go stop them now." Brown muttered.

"We ain't going anywhere before we get more backup!" One of the Feds shook his head. His voice trembled and Jerome couldn't really blame him. Getting up here had been a bloodbath, for all they know, there were still more of the bastards on the floors below waiting to ambush them and they had lost too many men already to simply push without stopping to think and figure out a better way to assault the building.

The cultists made the choice for them, fortunately just after the second SWAT unit managed to take defensive positions. Multiple doors slid open quietly enough for the sound to go unheard due to the chanting and shimmering, almost invisible in the darkness figures sprinted towards them.

"Contact!" A Fed shouted and opened up with a sub-machine gun. A heartbeat later, the roar of the guns within the enclosed space was deafening as everyone shot at anything they perceived as a threat. Glowing darts tore through the twilight and cut through ballistic armour as if it wasn't there. People screamed and fell, others simply crumbled silently with blades embedded in their sculls.

A shimmering figure fell to a hail of bullets, then another. A third got shot to pieces by shotguns, then a fourth impossibly ran _along_ the wall and the jumped at the cops with speed and agility that were simply inhuman. It had a glowing short sword in each hand and it put them to good use even before it landed. A Fed got his skull sliced in two, despite the helmet, another ended up with his throat torn out and slid along the wall in a shower of blood. Another brought his MP-5 to bear and sent a burst into the attacker's chests only to have his weapon and arms sliced through for his trouble before the second sword ended up slamming into his heart. The murderer kicked off the dead agent off his weapon and into two more agents before it blurred for a moment and then he was even deeper within the small defence perimeter, his swords piercing the chests of two more Feds.

Jerome fell a familiar terror – it was the same creeping feeling that froze him in the desert. Then it was like nothing he had ever experienced and it left him helpless while two of his friends died. This time around? It was still a surprise, yet not an outright shock. While everyone else looked like they moved through water, slow and ponderous, not to mention the panic spreading through them, Jerome got angry. He gripped his carbine tighter, switched on automatic, took a moment to aim and let lose at the shimmering enemy. At that range, there was no chance he could miss... and there were no alive friendlies between him and the target if he did anyway. He emptied the magazine in the murdered and got rewarded by its chest erupting in a fountain of blood. Whatever those leathers were, they weren't really bulletproof.

The murderer faltered and fell back a step. It appeared surprised that he got shot, yet, despite his chest bleeding profusely from multiple wounds, he didn't fall. Jerome just reloaded and emptied another magazine in him. This time it was the enemy's turn to crumble like a puppet with its strings cut. Once it was down, the terror clawing Brown's courage vanished as if it was never there and a moment of tense silence followed. Even the chanting appeared to falter for a brief instant.

"Check the wounded and get us some backup up here!" Jerome shouted, shaking the survivors out of their shock. Only now took a good look around. There were only six of the bastards that attacked them, just one got to them, yet that was more than enough to slaughter half of them. Brown shivered. If there were more of them, and there had to be because the chanting continued...

The Detective got a good look at the survivors. There was no way he could convince them to push through without a lot of backup. They all appeared shaken and shocked and he couldn't really blame them. Hell, he didn't feel much better.

"There might still be alive people in there." Jerome nodded towards the source of the chanting.

"There are some of those bastards left for sure." A Fed spat. They looked at each other. Frantic radio-chatter sounded in their ears – shouts for help met with demands for explanation and promises that paramedics and more backup were on the way.

"Contact!" An agent shouted and opened fire. Almost everyone left pointed their weapons toward the perceived threat, though couple of the SWAT members had the presence of mind to keep their sectors covered, protecting the flanks.

Two more of the shimmering figures emerged, however they didn't come towards them. Instead, one crashed into a wall as if struck by a truck. The other could be seen throwing one of those glowing knifes down the corridor towards the part that was shrouded in darkness. A massive gun thundered and that man's head blew up like a watermelon used for target practice. Heavy boots ran up the tilled floor followed by the sound of a door being kicked off its hinges – something that happened only in the movies unless breaching charges or shotguns were involved.

A moment of shocked silence followed and even the chanting paused. Someone shouted a frantic warning then the whole building shook when an explosion tore through the other part of the corridor, engulfing it in a wave of flames that fortunately died out before it reached the cops and federal agents – only a hot wind washed over them. The darkness hiding the other end of the corridor got consumed by the fires and Brown saw a tall, heavy armoured figure looking their way. Its face was covered by enclosed helmet that had to have either night or thermal vision built in because the eyes glowed red as they stared his way. The man had a very large unfamiliar weapon in his arms and some sort of missile launcher swung over his back. Despite the fire and smoke, Jerome could see a row of grenades attached to his belt.

Who the fuck was that?! The armoured figure turned around and vanished into an appartemt at the far end of the corridor.

The chanting didn't resume.

* * *

 **=X=**

 **Part 4**

 **=X=**

 **10 January 1994**

 **New York**

Two vans full with TF Dagger soldiers parked just outside the police cordon near the building where this cell of cultists hopefully made their last stand. Dutch exited, leaving his people behind and offered his face ID to the closest cop, which was enough to usher him in. So far, fear and the could had kept any big crowds from gathering, however there were a lot of journalists already crawling all over the place and asking questions.

Dutch was a bit peeved that his people proved more or less useless - if the cultists were dealt with for good, which he certainly hopped was the case. That only reinforced the TF's need for an investigation branch as well as finding ways to expedite deployment to any troublesome areas. At least in that regard, this mess could be beneficial. One had to look at the silver lining when there were any. Dutch learned that much the hard way after his disastrous encounter with that alien hunter.

He found his target, Detective Brown, slumped near the entrance of the building. The dark skinned man was talking with a smaller man and both wore bulletproof vests along with a lot of people scrambling all over the place making way only for an endless stream of paramedics who were busy darting into the building and pausing only to let their colleagues leave hauling casualties towards the ambulances.

That looked like right mess.

"Detective." Dutch greeted.

"Agent." Came the bitter response.

"Can we have a word in private?" Dutch inquired.

Brown looked at the beehive of activity surrounding them and nodded glumly. "I'll see you in a bit, Greg." He addressed his colleague and moved away from the wall. The Detective removed his vest and handed it to his buddy and they went to one of the empty police cars parked nearby.

"Can you tell me what exactly happened, Detective Brown?" Dutch asked gently. In the past few years he had too much experience handling people shell-shocked after their first encounters with what was supposed to be impossible.

Brown did as prompted.

"That's certainly new." For a moment Dutch was afraid that they had yet another hunter on their hands, however the cold, not to mention the armour and weapons carried by the put that fear to rest. That still left the question open, who aided the police and FBI this night? How did they know where to find the cultists or did they follow the local law enforcement and used them to track the cultists?

"Detective, I know this isn't the best time, however I feel compelled to make you an offer. You just saw what's out there for a second time. We need people like you – with experience investigating and who know the score. As things stand, we're still scrambling in the dark and all too often arrive just in time to sweep a bloodbath away from the eyes of the media. We need to be proactive, find people like the Cult of Dragon before they could slaughter their way across one of our cities."

Brown stared at Dutch with dull, tired eyes. "I'll think about it." He sighed.

"That's all I ask, Detective. I hope that we saw all the bastards for the time being."

"That wasn't all of them, was it?" Brown grimaced.

"May we be so lucky, though I don't believe it for a moment." Dutch shook his head.

"Joy."

* * *

 **=X=**

 **15 January 1994**

 **Somalia**

Early in the morning, a small village that was merely a footnote of no consequence on the maps, awoke to an unexpected sight. A pristine metal shipping container stood in the grass near the small dirt road that was the only connection between the settlement and what passed for civilization in that collapsed country. How did it get there was a mystery – no one heard it being brought during the night, which should have been impossible. With warlords and bands of criminals being an almost constant danger, sleeping lightly and being ready to either run or defend their homes had become a second nature lately.

When the village people went to investigate the strange sight, they noticed that there was no traces from a truck that could have brought the container, which left only transport by air – like one of those large black American helicopters that occasionally passed nearby. However, you had to be either deaf or dead not to hear one of those approach, much less drop something this large at their doorstep.

A few younger and still somehow naïve boys began babbling that this might be aid, like a real food! They had seen such containers when their fathers brought them to pick up aid before the warlords began to predictably steal it all. Before someone could stop them, the fools ran to the container and tried to pry its doors wide open.

The boys succeeded too. With the sun just rising, it cast its light from behind the container, making sure that its interior remained in the shadows. The villagers looked at each other and shuttled nervously. None of them liked surprises – in their experiences those were almost always bad news.

Something moved in the darkness inside the container. A long, low moan echoed between its metal walls. A figure slowly made its way out of the twilight and stumbled in full view of the villagers. It was a man, young, though it was hard to tell with his sickly grey skin. He wore a one piece brown jumpsuit and had some kind of ugly yellow foam slowly leaking from the corners of his mouth. Its unfocused eyes stared at the gathered crowd for a long moment before they slowly cleared a bit and focused on the closest people – the boys who opened the doors.

People shouted at the children to get away and those with weapons – AK-47 and some older rifles that still worked, at least some of the time, came forward and pointed them threateningly at the sick man. All they needed was to catch some kind of disease!

The sick man moaned louder and lunged. The villagers shot wildly at it, with only a pair of old and experienced hunters taking time to aim properly. Bullets slammed in the approaching man's shoulder and legs, one grazed his skull even. Then the hunters shot and one hit him near the heart with the other in the centre of the torso. That finally stopped the man who shook a few times. Bright yellow liquid leaked from the wounds instead of blood.

Instead of collapsing, the wounded man moaned louder and lunged again. Most of the villagers either ran or opened up on it for all they were worth and didn't stop until their magazines ran dry. A lot of bullets actually missed and either went wide or flew into the container, prompting more moans from the inside. However, they did in fact hit the strange wounded man enough times to make him fall.

A few of them shouted, proclaiming their victory, others reloaded with what little bullets they had left and a few cursed this new problem they had to deal with.

Legs shuttled over metal and more movement could be seen in the container. The armed villagers looked at each other, the at the man who they shot. One of the hunters barked an order and they aimed at the doors. More men, black, white and yellow, all of them wearing those same jumpsuits and all foaming at the mouth, exploded from the container. The villagers frantically shot at them, yet they lacked the discipline, training and as importantly in this case, numbers and bullets to stop the charge. More of them ran as the small horde approached. Others continued to fire and screamed their defiance.

The stranger didn't care. A few of them collapsed after someone hit a vital area, yet most of them just kept coming despite multiple bullets biting their flesh. Then they few upon those who didn't run and began feasting. That was enough to panic any villager who wasn't already on the run. The crazy men tore into those they caught as if they were starving but soon stopped, finding them not appetizing. Then they got up and began searching for proper food.


	8. Chapter 4 Parts 1&2

**Disclaimer: I don't own any of the X-COM or Mass Effect games, nor any other games, books or movies that might be mentioned or served as an inspiration of this story. It is not for sale or rent. I make no money of it.**

* * *

 **Chapter 4**

 **=X=**

 **Part 1**

 **=X=**

* * *

 **Super One-One**

 **17 January 1994**

 **Somalia**

"We're doing what exactly?" Sergeant Vega asked in his radio. In his ten years in the army, four of them as a part of Delta Force, he had to do a lot of weird and even more less than sensible things. That was army life for you.

This one however, took the cake. He looked at his two buddies, and the group of Rangers stuck on the Blackhawk with him. They seemed as be-widened at the orders as he felt. While it was true that law and order in Somalia had broken down and everything apparently went to hell in that country, which was one of the reasons they were there in the first place, this was new.

"We've got report of cannibals attacking a nearby village. The survivors ran away and eventually one of our informants heard of it. It happened in the morning two days ago. You're going to check it." Overlord Actual, the man on mission control back in the base sounded almost as disbelieving as Vega felt.

Granted, during the few short weeks he had been in Somalia, Vega had seen or heard of some pretty nasty shit. The food situation was critical, with warlords hitting various UN food distribution sites making things worse for the regular people, even when they weren't deliberately starving their rivals. But cannibalism? He shook his head. God damn it! He guessed that a group of people could have gone desperate or crazy enough to try it but, well, shit. Vega shook his head. He hated dealing with crazies. They were unpredictable, unstable and that could make even untrained amateurs dangerous.

Beside him, the Rangers were bantering and few of the greenhorns sounded even more incredulous at the idea of cannibals than he was. The Blackhawk and its two recon helicopter escorts carrying a fire-team each flew relatively low, just outside of easy RPG range. Below them passed fields with tall green grass thick enough to hide couple of companies and the odd cluster of trees. Soon, Vega could see the village Overlord Actual ordered them to investigate. The first thing Vega noticed was a tall pillar of black smoke rising in the air above their target. It coiled like a demented snake thanks to the light wind twisting it in all directions.

The recon birds accelerated and swept away to do their thing and soon their pilots reported.

"Super One, Eye One-One. We've got a cargo container of all things abandoned near the entrance. Looks like one of those used to ship in food, though brand new. Damn, I'm seeing bodies on the ground in front of it."

Vega checked his weapon then looked through the open side door at where the recon bird circled.

"There are various slow movers in the village. Huh, they're all wearing the same kind of brown jumpsuits – it's like some kind of uniform. I haven't seen locals wear something like this since being deployed here."

Anyone but foreign military and aid personnel wearing anything resembling standard uniforms in Somalia had vanished soon after the last local government and what was left of the army disintegrated and plunged the country into the quagmire it was now. Vega had to agree with the pilot.

"Eye One-One, Overlord Actual. Buzz them to get their attention then go ask some pointed question and be careful. I don't want to write home explaining how one of you got munched on by crazy. Overlord Actual, out."

Vega shook his head again. This day was getting weirder and weirder. "Leo, Max, look alive." He whispered to his fellow operators.

One of the smaller flew above the village just above the rooftops making sure everyone alive down there would be very much aware they had visitors. The people on the ground finally turned their heads towards the source of the disturbance.

"Holly shit, those are zombies!" Someone exclaimed over the radio, forgetting comms protocol.

"Overlord Actual here, please repeat that." The mission commander sounded less than pleased.

"Overlord Actual, Eye One-Two. I'm looking at a person with multiple gunshot wounds in the chest moving below me and staring blankly at my bird. Bloody hell, he's bleeding something yellow too!" The pilot sounded incredulous as if he didn't believe his own words, which was all right. Vega found it hard to buy it too.

"Eye One-One, Super One-One, Overlord Actual. Can someone confirm?" The commander asked carefully. By the sound of it, he was half convinced that the other pilot had lost it.

"Boys, keep your eyes open." One of the Blackhawk pilots said. "I'm getting a bit lower to take a better look."

The large helicopter descended and began circling around the outer edges of the village. Vega shouldered his weapon, using its scope to get a better look. He saw one of the moving figures and zeroed on it. "Fuck me sideways!" He cursed. "Overlord Actual, Metal One-One. I've got eyes on a... person moving around with a part of their forehead missing." Even years of training and experience weren't enough to keep Vega's voice even. He took a better look and blanched at the impossibility. "Make that a piece of their brain too – I'm seeing it through my scope right now!"

"Overlord Actual, Metal One-Two, I can confirm." That was Leo, observing through the scope of his M-14.

Long moments of silence followed. Below them, the zombies or whatever they were begun moving to gather under the helicopters.

"You think they want to eat our brains?" A Ranger asked.

"I wish I could tell you that you were full of shit, as usual." Another one grumbled. "However, I'm afraid you might be right this one time, Corporal."

"Super One-One, Eye One-One and One-Two, Overlord Actual. Your are to remain on station until reinforcements arrive, then you will secure the site while it is being investigated for any and all contamination. Be advised from this point on you are under quarantine and not to leave the area nor approach the base or any populated area without being explicitly ordered to."

"Do you think this quarantine thing will be enough?" Max asked.

"Survivors from the village made their way to some place where one of our informants heard about this and that was why we were sent. If this thing's viral, it might not be contained." Vega grimaced. "We might already be exposed to whatever it is so let's hope it isn't airborne. Whatever you do, try not to get bitten."

"Do you think shooting them in the head works?" A Ranger asked.

Vega looked at the... zombie who had a chunk of his forehead missing.

"Make sure to double-tap and see if that works." He looked at the carbine in his hands then at the circling recon birds. Those at least had miniguns mounted, not to mention the pair on each side of the Blackhawk. He hoped that would be enough fire-power to keep them safe from getting bitten if command ordered them to the ground.

* * *

 **=X=**

Two hours later, three more Blachawks chock full with soldiers and four more recon birds armed to the teeth arrived on station. All the NBC protection the newcomers had were gas-masks and at least they brought some spares for the forces already there. Considering what they were ordered to do, for the first time in his life, Vega found himself longing for those heavy and hot NBC suits the army had just for the case of some kind of spill or an outbreak.

Currently, there were none in Somalia.

"Let me get this straight." Leo repeated. "We're to go down there," He pointed at the Zombies staring at them, "subdue as many of those as we can for study and try to figure out what is the source of the outbreak."

"We're all potentially compromised." Vega sighed. He could agree with the logic, especially if the situation couldn't be contained, which after two days of surviving villagers running who knows where to and meeting all kinds of people... If whatever caused the zombies was virulent... That was a nightmare scenario straight out of a bad B-movie or a cheap book. What Vega wasn't totally on board with was that they did the initial containment and investigation without proper protective gear, however he could understand it. Time could be of the essence and they could already be exposed anyway. "There's no point arguing. We're landing on that clearing, getting gas-masks and gloves, then we'll secure the place."

One of the new Blackhawks was already landing and this one had only two people in besides the pilots, however it was loaded with the gear that would hopefully keep Vega, his people and the Rangers from becoming zombies as well.

Zombies... the mere thought boggled the mind.

* * *

 **=X=**

 **Part 2**

 **=X=**

 **Outbreak area**

 **17 January 1994**

 **Somalia**

Sergeant Vega double and then triple checked his gas mask, then the heavy work gloves that the reinforcements brought. Those would make using weapons harder, yet they were better than nothing. The NCO couldn't help it but think that it might be all for naught, however if that was the case and it was already too late, there was nothing he could do about it so there wasn't much point worrying about that possibility. He and the rest of the soldiers were either already exposed or they were going to be all right as long as they could keep themselves from being bitten.

"Is everyone geared up?" Vega shouted. The mask distorted his voice into something strange and disturbing.

"We're ready, boss-man." Came Leo's muffled response.

"We're as good as we can be." The Ranger's Sergeant confirmed their readiness.

As the most senior NCO, Vega was in charge of the two Ranger squads that his team accompanied on their interrupted recon mission. A young Captain was up in one of the newly arrived Blackhawks and in overall command of the situation.

"Good. You know the plan. We're going to secure the road into the village, check on that container and try subduing one of the zombies after the fly-boys entangle it." He nodded at one of the choppers buzzing above. Where they found a set of nets with their ends weighted with metal balls for this purpose on such a short notice, Vega wasn't sure he wanted to know. "The ROEs are thus: We give one verbal warning, one warning shot and if that doesn't stop them from coming, we shoot them until they stop moving. Keep your eyes open, watch each other backs and do not get bitten or I'll shoot you myself just in case!"

A lot of grumbling followed. Vega personally would have preferred to have the recon birds strafe the place until nothing was moving and then call the air-force if at all possible to bomb the place straight to hell. Oh, he could understand command's logic – they needed to figure out the fuck was going on so samples were needed. However, as one of the suckers sent to retrieve said sample, Vega retained the right to bitch and moan about the injustice of it all.

At least in his own mind anyway. Half the all too young looking Rangers appeared freaked out enough already for him to even entertain the thought of adding to the pressure with his own bitching.

"Form on me and watch the grass. The last thing we need is to get surprised by these things. Overlord Actual, Home-plate Actual, Metal One-One, we're ready to proceed."

"Metal One-One, Overlord Actual. You're a go. Gods speed son."

Vega carefully made his way through the long grass. His eye darted all over the place looking for any sign of movement. In the distance, he could see the shambling figures of the zombies, who for now at least concentrated their attention on a pair of helicopters on station above them. As they got closer, the Sergeant could hear one of the airborne soldiers shouting warnings on multiple languages. No one really believed it would work, but who knew, there might be someone not undead or whatever those things were, not to mention a surviving villager hiding somewhere in the ramshackle settlement.

A Ranger platoon deployed by the other Blackhawks was making their way on the flanks of the group that Vega led, ready to sweep and clear the village.

"Metal One-One, Home-plate Actual. They're non-responsible. We've got eyes on a pair of them near the container. Approach and assess their status. Do not take any unnecessary risks.

"Home-plate Actual, Metal One-One, roger that." As if what they were doing wasn't risky enough. "You heard the Captain. I'll make the approach. Watch my back."

Soon enough they got close to the container. It was good thing to see up close a confirmation that those zombies could be killed. Three of them laid on the ground near its open doors riddled with bullets and didn't show any sign of movement. They did see it from the air and that was in fact one of the reason why command authorised this whole circus in the first place or so Vega thought.

"Hey, look at me!" He shouted at one of the two Zombies just hanging near the open doors.

The closest one had its back turned to the Sergeant and he could see multiple gunshot wounds in it. They were from AK or something else that threw large slugs – there were huge chunks missing from the back, more than enough to kill an ordinary man twice over. Up close, the itchor those things had for blood looked more orange than yellow or perhaps it was just that way once it dried. That was another thing that got Vega's attention – none of the wounds was bleeding any longer.

"Max look for a stone on the ground and throw one at the legs of the closest zombie." Vega ordered. Orders or no orders he wasn't looking forward to getting any closer. He briefly removed his eyes from the threat in front of him to look at the other Zombies. Most of them had gathered in one large mob in the centre of the village and stared dumbly at a recon bird hovering above them. At least they were easily distracted.

A jagged stone flew past Vega and struck the closest zombie in the shin. The thing moaned and slowly turned around. A pair of unfocused bloodshot eyes, which in this case meant bulging yellow veins, eventually focused on Vega.

"Get on your knees." The Sergeant said then repeated it again on the few local dialects he had memorized it on.

The zombie didn't hear or care. Instead, it lunged his way. "Light them up!" Vega snapped and sent a few bursts into its chest as his training dictated. Only then did it register that this was a zombie and by that point it's torso got already shredded by the soldiers behind the Sergeant. Apparently, if you filled one of those things with enough lead, you didn't need to shoot them in the head because. That particular zombie twitched few times after it hit the ground and laid still. The one behind it didn't fare much better, though Leo did blow off the back of its head after double-tapping it with his M-14.

"Overlord Actual, Home-plate Actual, Metal One-One. I can confirm that those things do seem to die when shot enough. They are unresponsive to verbal stimuli. I recommend we dispatch most of them from the air and only then we proceed to capture... samples for further investigation."

"Metal One-One, Home-plate Actual, I concur. Reaper Flight, confirm that we have stragglers away from the main concentration."

"Home-plate Actual, Reaper One, I have eyes on a small group at the north edge of the village, over."

"Reaper Flight, Home-plate Actual, keep it under observation. We'll be capturing a few of those. You have permission to neutralize the main concentration. Fire for effect."

The recon bird that floated above the village made itself scarce and moments later three more, configured as gunships unleashed their rocked pods and miniguns upon the zombies milling in the centre. Vega was glad to see that explosives and volume of fire worked wonders on them. That little horde got reduced into chunks of meat in a short order.

"Victor One-One, Home-plate Actual, you have permission to execute capture run. Metal One-One, follow Victor One-Two's lead." Another helicopter came over Vega's group, it jaunted merrily and slowly headed north.

"Home-plate Actual, Metal One-One. I have eyes one Victor One-Two and am following."

A few minutes later, they were on the edge of the village where two zombies were struggling under weighted nets. One more looked dumbly at them and a fourth was shambling after a retreating recon bird.

"Take out those on their feet, then we'll figure out how to secure our captives." Short burst of aimed fire later and two more zombies hit the dirt. "Now does anyone has an idea on how to secure those two?" He pointed at the snared zombies with his weapon.

"Ductape?" The Ranger's Sergeant asked.

Vega paused, kicking himself for not thinking about something so obvious, then he frowned. "Does anyone carry a row?"

"I've got only detcord." Max said.

"I've got some." Leo added.

"Good. Now how do we do this without getting bitten?" Vega wondered aloud. Once the two snared zombies finally noticed them they began struggling harder to break free.

"Dog-pile them?" A Ranger asked.

"Might as well." Vega sighed.

Shouts and rapid fire came from deeper in the village, where the Ranger platoon was busy sweeping for more zombies and survivors.

"Contact right!" Max shouted.

Vega didn't think. He trusted his friend and just acted at the warning going low and aiming to the right, sweeping his weapon in a search for targets. A zombie tore out of a nearby building moving at close to a sprint – a far cry from the slow movements of the others. It's face and the front of its jumpsuit were covered with gore, a bit of red but mostly yellow. The Sergeant took aim and opened fire, joining Max and a couple of Rangers who were already firing.

This one didn't go down so easily. Multiple bursts shredded its torso, bullets smashed its face, yet it kept coming propelled by its momentum. For a long moment Vega was afraid that it would manage to reach one of the Rangers of worse, Max, however twelve people pumping burst after burst into it from point blank range was simply too much and it fell just a metre short from the closest soldier.

"Fuck, that was close." Max muttered.

"Home-plate Actual, Metal One-One, be advised, there are fast movers too. We just got jumped by one and it almost got one of us."

"Metal One-One, Home-plate Actual, we noticed. One of those just managed to bite a Ranger at the east side of the village. Secure the packages and hold your position until the area is secured."


	9. Chapter 4 Parts 3&4

**Disclaimer: I don't own any of the X-COM or Mass Effect games, nor any other games, books or movies that might be mentioned or served as an inspiration of this story. It is not for sale or rent. I make no money of it.**

* * *

 **Chapter 4**

 **=X=**

 **Part 3**

 **=X=**

* * *

 **18 January 1994**

 **Washington DC**

" _The Congress will continue to debate the Homeland Defence Act tomorrow. If passed, the HDA will grand Federal and State Law Enforcement agencies across the country an unprecedented level of funding and authority..."_

" _In New York the battle between NYPD, Federal Agents and the Scorpions gang continues..."_

" _A third day of protests at Media Square Garden..."_

President Franklin tuned out the multiple TVs that covered one wall of the situation room currently displaying all major US news channels and looked at the pictures from New York and Somalia spread all over his corner of the long oaken table. He wanted to dismiss the tale told by those images as an elaborate joke and call those who brought them insane. If he could do so with a clear conscience, it would have been a relied.

However, there was simply too much evidence, too many of the bodies… or pieces of bodies, attesting that something weird and deadly was going on. It was becoming painfully clear that it wasn't confined to a single continent or even a hemisphere, a fact that complicated the situation to no end.

"Zombies..." Franklin shook his head in exasperation after he looked back at the newest photos.

The CDC and the military were busy flying specialists into the quarantine zone in Somalia, including people from Task Force Dagger... to think that such weird events happened often enough that the military had a dedicated unit dealing with them... The President rubbed his temples and contemplated popping another aspirin. He closed the folder and called in one of his Secret Service minders.

"John, make sure that Colonel Bernstein comes to meet me straight away once he arrives."

"Of course, sir." Franklin nodded thankfully at the agent and when he left, he opened the next folder. As if zombies and cultists with what might very well turn out to be magical powers weren't enough, aliens apparently were real too and he got briefed on them just now – more than a year after being sworn to office. He had to wonder what else he needed to know but no one bothered to tell him? Perhaps the Colonel, who was neck deep in this weird shit, might be able to enlighten him.

The President browsed through various summaries of TF Dagger's successes and failures. Most of the later were issues of timing – by the time anyone knew something was wrong and figured to call them, more often than not the operatives got there just in time to bury the bodies and try cover up the weirdness. Something had to be done about that – another New York or worse couldn't be allowed to happen if it was at all possible to prevent it, much less on American soil.

Franklin took a moment to contemplate popping up another aspirin or even asking for something a bit stronger, but soon dismissed the idea along with the desire for a strong, stiff drink. He needed his head as clear as possible for this and whatever other weirdness he would be briefed about. At least the headache wasn't bad enough, yet, to warrant more medicine.

This damn job was going to be the death of him. Franklin took a deep breath and continued to browse the stack of highly classified files. He was frankly becoming afraid of what new horrors awaited him in the innocently waiting folders.

Colonel Bernstein arrived a few minutes later and he was punctual, something Franklin learned to appreciate a long time ago. In his opinion, there was never enough time for him to allow himself to waste it and that maxim had never been truer since he became a President. Now, on a good day he had to deal with a crisis or two before breakfast, with more demanding his attention long before lunch.

Once the introductions were done and they were alone with only one of the President's shadows hovering in a corner of the situation room, Franklin invited the Colonel to sit and began grilling him for information.

"Your people just dropped a real viper's nest of issues in my lap, Colonel. Why am I learning of this just now?" The President demanded.

"That decision has been taken way above my pay-grade, sir." The officer's calm exterior didn't even flicker at the terse demand.

Franklin merely nodded sharply. He should have known better than to let his temper slip its leash – Bernstein has been the man in charge of dealing with these horror stories for years now. Compared to what was in some of those files, even merely the aftermath Dagger had to clean up, the President guessed even a pissed off Commander in Chief wouldn't be enough to rattle him.

"How do we deal with this, Colonel? You've known about it much longer than me, obviously. You must have some ideas." The President spoke in a much calmer tone. "These cults, aliens and now zombies of all things..." He rapped a knuckle over a picture from Somalia. "What else do I need to know about this that isn't in these files?"

"That's just it, sir. We don't know enough. We need to study these things, understand what we're really dealing with. Are aliens responsible for everything merely using advanced technology? What we've seen with some of these cults..." Bernstein shrugged.

"Know your enemy." The President nodded. "What do we know for a fact?"

"We have multiple threats we're barely aware of. Let's take the incursion in Guatemala for example – our best guess is that our people there ran into a hunter, Codename Predator, who was for all intents and purposes on a safari and we're the game. Through intelligence channels and occasionally history records, we believe that they love the heat – almost every suspected appearance had two things in common – the place was damn hot and there was a conflict in the area. As for the way they operate – we've been able to trace incursions through the trophies they take, though not all events are confirmed. Sometimes, its just people being complete bastards and using the chaos of conflict to sate their sick urges. The Middle East, Africa, South America, we've got potential incursions all over the place." Bernstein paused to take a breath. "They all had a third thing in common too – the Predator is gone long before we can get there even if we heard of a possible appearance in time. That is the other big issue we have beyond the lack of information, Mr President – we simply can't react fast enough to these incidents."

"Those are the two primary issues we have?"

"The ones we can do something about in the foreseeable future. To be blunt – if a species that can travel across the stars arrive above our heads tomorrow with a fleet, there won't be much we can do, especially if they don't care about collateral damage. That however, isn't something that I'm tasked with dealing at this time, sir. On the other hand, responding and dealing with these cultists, Predators using us as prey and the other strange things cropping up all over the place lately – that might just be something we can deal with."

Franklin studied his guest for a few moments. Bernstein still looked calm and composed, like a man with a plan.

"You've thought about those issues and I hope you have some solutions to present me with." The President stated.

"Yes, sir. While Task Force Dagger has some of the best soldier in our armed forces, they do no one any good if they can't get in place when they're needed. I do have various ideas on how to solve this issue. First, we will need to station units at least in three if not more strategically located bases – one at each seaboard and at least one in the flyover states. We'll need further units with appropriate support at bases all over the world that are in a close proximity to conflict areas. This connects with my next point – we will need a way to reach an incident area much faster – black hawks don't really cut it unless its relatively close to a base and an airborne insertion has its own issues. Ideally, we'll need a new transport aircraft for insertions – supersonic, with range of couple of thousand miles when fully loaded and fuelled and able to carry a strike team, preferably complete with some kind of light vehicle to provide fire support. If we have something like that would greatly simplify logistics and allow us to concentrate our personnel in a smaller number of locations. Not to mention that the faster such a vehicle would be, the less time it would need to spent in a contested area when someone could shoot it down."

"Well, I don't know if we have something like that even on the drawing board much less in a prototype stage. Dispersing and expanding Task Force Dagger to allow a better response time on the other hand is perfectly doable." The President allowed. He didn't want to think how expensive such an aircraft would be, nor how much the air force would scream bloody murder because they were currently too busy trying to preserve their shiny toys – the fighter and bomber fleet, an issue in a post Cold War world. The military budged wasn't what it used to be back when the USSR was a credible threat.

"I know, sir. Realistically, dispersion is our only short term alternative. This brings us to the primary issue we have – it doesn't matter how fast we can react if we don't know something is happening until it is too late."

"What do you believe you need, Colonel?"

"An investigative branch to back up our combat and small scientific arm. Perhaps expanding our science team once we're in position to better react to incursions and can recover actionable intelligence and artefacts for study – at least for things that are too sensitive."

"Like if you manage to capture or kill and recover a Predator or its technology." Franklin nodded. Keeping the existence of aliens would be vital until that was no longer possible or there was a viable way to combat them that could be presented to the public at large, otherwise sheer panic could cause as much if not more damage than an honest to God invasion.

"Correct, sir. We've done what we could – approached a few people while dealing with clean up or more recently, the mess in New York – like one of the Detectives investigating the cult activities. We need more such people. Another thing – if at all possible, I must recommend an effort to increase the proliferation of computers through law enforcement agencies all across the country and linking them in a single network so we could monitor for odd events and respond appropriately and that's just the start, sir. Like it or not, so far many of these incidents are happening outside of our reach and we don't know if there are any or how they are handled across large swathes of the globe..." Bernstein trailed off.

"You want to bring our allies on board." It was obvious to Franklin what the Colonel was trying to say, he could see the benefits too, and the dangers. Access to alien technology - that could be the one thing determining if the United States would remain the sole super power, become the first among equals at best or fall back… On the other hand… He could think about many worst case scenarios now that the existence of the impossible was all but confirmed. Franklin halted that trail of thought and refocused on the Colonel, who looked unsettled for the first time since entering the room. "There is more, isn't it?"

"Not just our allies, sir. While, we'll need to at least share intelligence about these events, at least at first, we'll need more. Who knows what's happening in the former Soviet block? With the chaos there, all kinds of players can run wild." Bernstein pointedly looked up. "Worst case scenario and I certainly hope I'm just paranoid, with the Russian economy in a meltdown who knows who or what can take a piece of the pie, set shop in there or try to take over the place."

And wasn't this a nightmarish thought, Franklin grimaced.

"I think we're getting ahead of ourselves, Colonel. I too hope you're being merely too paranoid." For all our sakes, the President thought. "Let's get back to the beginning. What else do I need to know in order to make an informed decision? What I can promise you at this point for sure are more resources to investigate this weirdness coming out of the woodwork."

* * *

 **=X=**

 **Part 4**

 **=X=**

 **19 January 1994**

 **TF Dagger HQ**

 **Fort Bragg**

Colonel Bernstein sat heavily in his chair with a sigh. While on the face of it his meeting with the President was widely successful, it was much longer than expected and combined with the situation in Somalia, saw to it he hadn't taken a blink of an eye in thirty six hours running. Soon, he would have to get a bit of shut eye before his judgement began to suffer in earnest, but before that he had orders to give. He was contemplating getting another coffee to keep him awake when his XO and S2 walked in. He waved them to sit down.

"The meeting with the President went better than expected." Bernstein began. "First brief me on any new developments."

"At this time we know of nothing new besides Somalia. There are two potential areas where a Predator might appear, however we don't have assets in place." Koen reported. "On the situation in Somalia – Dr Lam and Duch's strike team are on the way. ETA is in about eight hours. So far there are no new outbreaks detected and no sight that whatever is causing the situation is contagious. The one confirmed bitten soldier responds well to treatment and there is in sign at this time that he will become one of those… zombies." Koen grimaced when pronouncing the term. "Dissection and proper research would need to wait until the CDC and USAMRIID (United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases - Army bio-defense) on the ground and properly set up. ETA – twenty four to thirty six hours. Our forces in the area along with allied units are all on high alert and ready for any eventuality or so they claim. That's all for now, sir."

Bernstein took a few moments to digest the information and it was noticeably longer than usual. Damn it, it wasn't that long when he could take twenty four to forty eight hours without much or any sleep and still more or less function. He was slowly but surely getting bloody old.

"Good. Keep monitoring the situation. I'll want report the moment Lam has something for us. Now on my meeting with the President. Contrary to what we feared, we won't be getting shot for treason or sent to the loony bin." Bernstein cracked a smile. "We're actually being expanded. Charles, I'll need you to dust off our plan for dispersing the TF. At least initially we'll be stationed in five bases nationwide to provide better coverage and response time. We'll get the boost in soldiers we need for the rapid response teams and when needed will draw on local forces for backup. For the time being the R&D personnel and facilities will be concentrated here, however we'll have dedicated containment units built at each base in case we actually manage to bag something and need to hold it there."

"I'll see to it, sir." The XO nodded.

"Koen, its your lucky or unlucky day." Bernstein smirked. "We're getting the Intel and investigation expansion we sorely need and that will be yours to deal with. Once the President has spoken with the directors of the relevant alphabet soup, you'll be able to draw personnel from them and set up liaisons to monitor for as he put it, 'this God damned weirdness'."

Koen grimaced. It was a public secret that many of those agencies didn't play well with each other – either because of egos, because they fought about budget or jurisdiction. Sometimes, all of the above. That in itself was one of the issues he had with figuring out what the hell was happening in time and that was just in the US. "I'm overjoyed at then news, sir." He was sure he managed to keep the sarcasm out of his voice. This was exactly what TF Dagger needed, it was another matter that it would be a nightmare for him to straighten out.

"Oh, it gets better. The President will work on slowly bringing in our allies so we could initially get a better Intel worldwide and see what exactly they have to deal with that goes bump into the night. For starters, he'll bring up our work when the British Prime Minister comes to visit in couple of months. Meanwhile, the State Department will begin to prepare the groundwork with our NATO allies and ensuring that didn't blow up in our faces would be a full time job in itself. I'll recommend you both get your ducks in order because very soon we will be busier than we ever were." Bernstein paused. He knew he was forgetting something. Ah. "Finally, the President will want a liaison with us to keep him in the loop when we have a situation. Get me a list of appropriate people. Now barring a new disaster, I'm leaving you to mind the shop and going to get a few hours of shut-eye before I become a zombie craving all the coffee. Get me up if something happens. Dismissed."

* * *

 **=I=**

 **19 January 1994**

 **The White House**

 **Washington DC**

It wasn't often that the Directors of the CIA, FBI and NSA were called to meet the President, together, without a prior notice. The only reasons it took them until the night of the nineteenth to gather was the time it took for Neal Asher to arrive from Fort Meade and for Franklin's Chief of Staff to clear an appropriate block of time.

The fact that the President met then in the Situations room instead of his office and had a large stack of folders ready for each of them didn't bode well.

"Gentlemen, sit down." Franklin ordered and pointed at the table. Moments later, the only other person in the room beside the Directors and the President was the same Secret Service agent who was present during the meeting with Colonel Bernstein.

Of the three visitors, only the FBI Director, Kyle Harrison looked a bit nervous. He was the youngest of them and newest to his job, which he got after his predecessor suffered a heart attack driving home from work.

"Task Force Dagger, the Godawful mess in New York, the situation in Somalia and what they all have in common – what do you know about it and how long did you intent to keep me in the dark?" Franklin asked in a deceptively light and friendly tone.

Harrison looked genuinely at loss at those questions, however the chief spooks had their faces carefully blank. That by itself was telling unless the FBI Director was much better at deception than the President gave him credit for.

George Bradford, CIA's Director casually took the top folder in front of his seat and opened it. His expression didn't change at seeing the aftermath of one of the few confirmed Predator hunts.

"The military finally briefed you, I see." Bradford raised a greying eyebrow but nothing else changed on his face.

"They and you should have done it soon after I took office."

"At the time it wasn't deemed of importance. In light of New York and the situation in Somalia, that was a mistake." Asher, the oldest and most experienced in the group allowed.

"Dare I ask what is happening in Somalia that has something to do with New York?" Harrison asked.

"Fucking zombies, pardon my French." Bradford explained succinctly.

"Which should be impossible, just like some of the things that happened in New York, but we aren't so lucky. What else do you know. What do our allies and enemies know and do about this weirdness. Talk." Franklin fixed asher with a cold stare.

"I really don't have much to add on top of Colonel Bernstein's briefing." Asher began. "However, certain signal intercepts indicate there have been odd happenings in our allies backyards. Unconfirmed ones in the former Soviet block too..."

"And I'm hearing about it just now because?" The President smiled thinly. "Deciding to inform me was way beyond Bernstein's pay-grade as he pointed out so feeding him to me as a peace offering didn't work. Explain yourselves, gentlemen." And better make it good, he added silently.


	10. Chapter 4 Parts 5&6

**Disclaimer: I don't own any of the X-COM or Mass Effect games, nor any other games, books or movies that might be mentioned or served as an inspiration of this story. It is not for sale or rent. I make no money of it.**

* * *

 **Chapter 4**

 **=X=**

 **Part 5**

 **=X=**

* * *

 **20 January 1994**

 **Somalia**

Even in January, the weather in Somalia was rather hot by the standards of everyone not accustomed to desert or tropical climate. That little fact made the lives of the US troops managing the quarantine area and the scientists flown in to find what the hell was happening, the next best thing to hell. After all, even at the best of times, the NBC protection gear was hellishly hot and unpleasant to work in.

It was even worse for the poor bastards designated to patrol the area in a search for local survivors, zombies that had wandered out before the first response teams arrived, not to mention they needed to act as a security – against practically everything, from wild animals that might be infected to one of the local warlords deciding to investigate and perhaps grab a few hostages or expensive equipment or even whoever engineered the disaster coming back to check on their handiwork. Humvees and APCs blocked the few dirt paths leading in and out of the area and gunships constantly circled above.

That was the sight that greeted Dr Lam when a Blackhawk commandeered by TF Dagger brought her to the site along with her escort – Major Dutch and a two squad of his soldiers. While the heat in the area wasn't considered enough to make the appearance of Predators likely, no one was taking any chances.

From the air, Carolyn saw hastily erected tents for biohazard fieldwork – they were made of thick plastic and rubber with the field labs sealed as well as possible including a large portable air-conditioning system that among other things ensured a difference in pressure between the lab and the outside world.

The moment they landed, a group of armed soldiers covered in a protective gear out of a Hollywood movie greeted them.

"Major Dutch? Sergeant Kowalski. I need to see a copy of your identification and authorisation papers."

The huge Major nodded as well as he could within his protective gear and picked up a sack containing the needed copies – the originals were safe back in the base where they boarded the Blackhawk. A few minutes of inevitable red tape later, the Sergeant led them away from the landing pad.

"Can you bring us up to speed, Kowalski?" Dutch asked.

"What exactly do you need to know, sir?"

Dutch waved at Carolyn signalling that this was her show.

"Does any of the first responders show any sings of an infection or becoming..." Lam paused as the word initially refused to exit her mouth. This whole thing should have been utterly ridiculous nonsense after all… "zombie?" She managed to spit.

"The last I heard, the fellow who got bitten so far suffers from a mild infection consistent with an animal bite. According to the grapevine he's either responding well to treatment or busy mutating into something straight out of a movie." Kowalski shrugged. "Since there hasn't been an update for us security types hopefully we won't have killer mutants running around anytime soon. There has been no trace of animals acting strangely, the same is true about the locals that those things attacked – they're dead and so far staying that way."

They stopped in front of the field lab, where the Sergeant exchanged a few words with the guards and the Major had to show once again their authorization before Carolyn and Dutch were waved through with the rest of her Dagger guards staying outside.

Soon enough they were past the field decontamination chamber and in the lab itself. It was divided in two parts – most of it consisted of all the bells and whistles a regular hot bio-research laboratory would have. However, to the right of the entrance was an area walled off by transparent plastic and rubber – a small morgue set up for autopsies.

Six people – four men and two women, all in soft protective suits were busy working, with another pair visible in the morgue.

"Mel, it's your turn to deal with the distractions." A grouchy male voice came from the far end of the lab. The closest woman looked up from the microscope she was using and rolled her eyes.

"Dr Melinda Halsey, a pleasure. You don't look like our people? ARMIID?" She walked closer and now her face became clearly visible through the plastic visor. She was a not particularly tall woman with thin features and short read hair. Tired green eyes and streaks of sweat testified that even in the air-conditioned tent the defence gear was the next best thing to a sauna – or your personal oven.

"Dr Carolyn Lam, currently attached to the army." She nodded at Dutch who simply stood behind her and did his best impression of a small implacable hill. "Can you bring us up to speed? What are we dealing with here? A virus? Something bacterial? Perhaps a prion?"

"A parasite actually." Dr Halsey looked around and pointed at a table deeper in the lab. It was covered with large thick metal jars full with various kinds of liquid and all of them held twisted and torn pieces of red and orange flesh. "I wish we had the proper tools to run it a DNA test here but that would have to wait until we're cleared to bring samples to a full-scale lab. Whatever this thing is, it's either heavily mutated, engineered or likely both."

"What does it do, exactly?"

"Well, that's both fascinating, terrifying and should be impossible" Dr Halsey grimaced. "All this is very preliminary, you understand?"

Caroline nodded firmly. "I won't hold you against you." She smiled reassuringly.

"From the autopsies we already completed, it appears that the parasite makes its home in the chest and latches to the spine – from there it takes control and grows into the nervous system, eventually replacing it and hijacking the body. All specimens we've examined so far show that the people have been brain dead for some time, fortunately. From what we've seen so far, it either consumes or alters the organs to fuel its growth and there it gets really weird..."

"Is that the proper technical term?" Dutch asked.

"As good as any – we'll need days, weeks to be really sure, however it seems that the parasite doesn't use the body for fuel after the initial infestation is complete. There aren't enough organs to metabolise food for example. Further, while slow – likely due to imperfect control, there are enzymes in the muscles that strengthen them – yet there wasn't really a sign of atrophy or that the rest of the body is used as a food source. And this is the most interesting and strange part – most of the blood has been replaced by this orange liquid," Dr Halsey pointed at the table they found her working at. "I have never seen something like that." There were sealed vials with orange glowing liquid partially hidden by the microscope. "It's not radioactive – that was the first thing the soldiers checked once they figured out the zombies 'blood' glowed. At least no known radiation – we'll be studying it further. At this time exposure for a long time is not recommended, though it's not like we have much of a choice right now. Besides we all volunteered."

"Time is of essence. Our best guess is that this was a test for a terror bio-weapon. We need to know more – weaknesses, how it spreads, how to contain it and as if not more importantly, to figure out who is behind this." Dutch summarized their mission.

"That's why we're here." Dr Halsey nodded. "Again, I must stress this – preliminary analysis doesn't show any easy way for the parasite to infect other people. In fact, given how its practically fused with the spine, I don't believe it can move to another host. Further, we've found no way for it to reproduce. The working assumption is that whoever made it, which is becoming the more realistic hypothesis with everything we discover, didn't want it to procreate – at least not these specimens. Unfortunately, that also means that right now we don't know how it infested those poor bastards and if it is intended to be weaponized, how it would be done."

"If it is in the chest, there is no need of shooting the zombies in the head like in the movies?" The Major asked.

"From what we've seen so far, that would be pointless – the brain is practically dead. All bodily control is done by the parasite. Shoot zombies in the centre of the chest." Dr Halsey pointed a thumb at her chest, right between her breasts. "It's centred right behind the breast bone, which isn't a bad location – the ribs would provide best protection there. I can't tell you if a bullet grazing it would put one down in a timely fashion – while there are two surviving specimens., we haven't proceeded to test them. Currently, we're monitoring them and once there is more personnel here, we'll test their reactions to stimuli among other things. We'll need a better place for that – I heard that the army is flying in engineers to built us a decent temporarily facility where we can examine them properly."

* * *

 **=X=**

 **Part 6**

 **=X=**

 **20 January 1994**

 **Somalia**

Much of the technical discussion flew over Duch's head even if he had been hitting college and above level books in various disciplines that might come in handy in his new line of work. However, he was able to get the important bits anyway – the damn zombies didn't appear to be contagious, at least not as far as the parasite that made them possible was concerned. That said, getting bitten by a ripe corpse wouldn't be healthy anyway so it was to be avoided if at all possible. The things while rather slow were supposed to be tough and strong, though nothing that a few burst in the chest couldn't fix. As far as he was concerned, and he would be reporting it up the chain, these things weren't natural in any way, even if by some twisted turn of fate the parasites were a mere mutation someone found and decided to toy with. The unknown glowing stuff that passed for the zombies blood, the fact that it was the one thing that they might be able to metabolize – apparently, the captured ones refused to eat anything, fortunately that included attempts to bite people once properly subdued, clinched it. Whoever made and released these things had a nice kill-switch built in – once they ran of food they would starve no matter what they ate, if they were willing to eat or drink anything that wasn't said liquid.

That of course raised a simple question…

"If you're right, then why did they attack the villagers?" Dr Lam asked.

"We'll need to study the specimens to figure out what stimuli they respond to. Perhaps there was some kind of noise emitted that drove them into rage or something – not necessary something a human could even hear. The army boys thought to check the container they were delivered with but no joy – the last I heard, it was a standard shipping one, no modifications to speak of." Dr Halsey answered.

"Can I see their blood? I'm a bio-chemist, it might remind me of something..."

And with that, the boffins returned to the very technical aspects of their discussion. Dutch made a mental note to check both on the captured zombies and the soldiers who examined the container, the container itself too. Who new what might be there? If the thing was deemed safe enough, it would likely be shipped somewhere that it could be scoured from end to end for any trace of useful evidence.

* * *

 **=XCOM=**

A few unpleasant hours later, none of the boffins were any closer to figuring out something new and more importantly, useful, about the zombies. Dr Lam went away from the equipment she used to run tests on the blood in frustration.

"Let's go see the specimens. At best, we'll need a full fledged lab with all the cutting edge equipment money can buy to figure this out." She glared at an inoffensive piece of machinery.

Soon, they were back with the rest of the TF Dagger escort. Sergeant Kowalski was back too – he led them to one of the more solid buildings in the ramshackle village. The captured zombies were held inside – the three squads surrounding the one story building with weapons on the ready were a dead giveaway. Whatever furniture used to be in there had been cleared out and three metal poles had been hammered in the floor – as far away from the door and each other as space allowed.

"I should warn you, while slow and dumb, they're by all accounts, strong bastards. Stronger than people their size have any right to be. Besides the poor bastard who got bitten, we had two broken wrists, a few fingers and dislocated shoulders while subduing and tossing them up like turkeys." Kowalski explained.

The zombies were three men – two who might have been white but it wasn't certain with their skin being all pastry grey with bulging yellow and orange veins. The third one was obviously black, though there were patches of dark yellow all over his visible skin. They were all tied up to the poles with chains, ropes, even duct tape. At first glance, they all appeared to be dead – for long moments none of the zombies appeared to be breathing, if they were even able to do so. Eventually one rolled its head up towards the now open door and stared at them with unseeing eyes. The right one was milky and obviously blind and the other was bloodshot with the weird stuff that had replaced their blood. It actually sniffed at them – an inhuman sound that came from its chest, before relaxing.

"Fascinating…" Dr Lam muttered. "We'll need to run so many tests..."

Damn, boffins...

* * *

 **=XCOM=**

 **21 January 1994**

 **North African coast**

Winter clouds hid the stars and the thin crescent of the moon drowning the Mediterranean in darkness. The tremulous sea parted as a dark blue, almost black shape tore its way through the waves until it drove to a nearby beach that usually didn't see a soul during this time to the year. Silently, the machine made its way to the sand and with a quiet hiss immediately swallowed by the clash of the waves, its front opened to reveal a dimly lit interior. Two figures clad from head to toe in richly adorned dark green ropes rose from their seats and bowed deeply to the far end of the compartment.

A bubbling inhuman voice snapped a command and the duo hurried to grab a backpack from under their seats before jumping into the cold water. Knee-high rubber boots helped a bit and they soon waddled away from the sea. Behind them the submarine's entrance sealed and the craft vanished under the water as silently as it appeared.

"What's the new plan, mate?" The shorter of the two asked in a distinct British accent.

"For now we stay away from the Americas." The other one rasped. "We don't need that much scrutiny and there always are conflicts we can use in Africa and the Middle East. My predecessor got impatient and put us all on the radar. We can't afford to make the same mistakes again. Dagon will raise, however we do have time."

"Then we can go get somewhere warm and dry?"

As in on cue, it began raining snow.

"We should have a contact in a nearby village. First, lets change into something less conspicuous." The new High Priest of Dagon patted his backpack before opening it.

"That is all well and good, but what about our rivals?" The Brit asked. "Our benefactors did intercept unconfirmed reports of an outside interference."

"Didn't you hear? It's confirmed. The _mercenary_ was hired to make an example of my predecessor. That is another incentive to keep a low profile until we're ready. Our rival's masters can ruin everything if they suspect we're about to succeed and that is to be avoided at all costs."

"I thought he was just a rumour to scare initiates?" The Brit removed his robe revealing a lean muscled chest that had rows of greyish scales covering his ribs like overlapping plates of armour. He pulled out a thick cotton blouse from his pack and sighed in relief once he slipped it on. "I'm ready to kill someone for a hot drink."

"Me too." The High Priest followed suit, revealing that most of his body below the chest and above the elbows was covered by either tough looking grey skin or silver scales. "He's no myth." The Priest added. "Our benefactors have been tracking him and those like him for some time. Sometimes I wonder why so many kinds of beings began to turn up all over the place lately. However, their presence explains some of things our new friends are toying with."

"They will provide a stable source of income and armaments then?"

"So they say." The High Priest stuffed his robe into the backpack. "If they fail to uphold their part of the bargain, we'll use them as sacrifices. Until then, we'll facilitate the transport of various obsolete toys from our benefactors to the Syndicate. That's the deal and for the time being it suits us well enough." He patted his backpack again. "That's why once we're settled, you'll meet one of their representatives and bring them the samples."


End file.
